By Kathleen Bohné
Below you will find two excerpts from the Apr. 24 edition of “La Semana” newsletter. To read the complete articles and subscribe, please visit www.TheMexpatriate.com.
Anti-inflationary rhetoric from AMLO
President López Obrador does not usually take time to give accolades to big business in his mañaneras, but on May 4 he expressed his gratitude to giants of the private sector—Bimbo, Wal-Mart, Chedraui and others—for working with his government on an anti-inflation plan in which they will “voluntarily participate in stabilizing the price of 24 staple products” for six months. The president emphasized this does not mean controlling prices by decree, but rather an “alliance” with businesses to address their escalation.
Inflation in Mexico reached 7.74% in April, the highest rate in 21 years. One kilo of tortillas costs up to 17% more than it did one year ago. “It is very complicated for any government to reduce inflation; we are living through global inflation and in this context, it is difficult to take isolated action,” noted Carlos Serrano, chief economist at BBVA bank in an interview. “The effects [of this plan ] will be marginal…The BBVA forecast inflation rates for this year will not change.”
The “canasta básica” (basket of staples) is mostly made up of food items such as beans, corn, milk, bread, onions, tomatoes, etc but also includes soap and toilet paper. Carlos Slim has also agreed to maintain current prices of Telmex and Telcel internet and phone services.
Analysts point out that the “Anti-Inflation and High Prices Package” (PACIC) includes measures that were already in place, such as the elimination of the IEPS tax on gasoline, natural gas and electricity and AMLO’s agricultural programs, though the plan mentions distributing more fertilizer in efforts to stimulate production of staple crops such as corn, beans and rice. The proposal also includes “fortifying roadway security” and “reducing costs and time in customs”, which would seem to be standard government responsibilities rather than innovative strategies to combat inflation.
There are a few surprises in the initiative, such as the elimination of import tariffs on a number of the 24 staple goods, some of which are heavily protected by duties of up to 75%. It is unclear how the fallout will be addressed for Mexican producers who will now be competing with imported goods. “The announced import tariff reduction will last for six months…What happens at the end of this period? Will the previous tariffs come back into effect? Will there be a gradual plan to reduce tariffs? Will producers be compensated for their losses? We do not know any of this yet,” writes economist Valeria Moy in El País México.
The PACIC does not mention small and medium-sized businesses in the fight against inflation and as pointed out by Jesús Carrillo of IMCO (Mexican Institute on Competitiveness), “large businesses have bigger margins.” Wal-Mart can make up for profits lost to lower prices on certain items by raising others, but it is harder for the tiendita down the street to make similar adjustments.
López Obrador said he had asked Banxico (Mexico’s central bank) to not raise interest rates more, but they are expected to next week, as many other central banks around the world do the same in an effort to tamp down inflation.
Disappearances in Mexico: Part I
On one side, there are only names: and on the other, nameless bodies. Two parallel columns of statistics—99,787 missing and 52,000 unidentified dead—that reveal the abysmal negligence of the Mexican state.
“Between 2006 and 2021, there is an exponential growth of disappearances in the country, an increase of 98%. This shows the close relation between the beginning of the ‘guerra contra el narcotráfico’ begun in Felipe Calderón’s term (2006-12) and he increased disappearances.” Forensic experts have concluded that it would take 120 years for the remains of victims to be identified under current conditions, which is referred to as a “forensic crisis” in the United Nations Committee on Enforced Disappearances (CED) report on Mexico, published April 12.
“In Mexico there is one actor that does not want to find the disappeared, dead or alive: the system. A system that has no strict standards, no clear protocols, no budget, no staff and no sensitivity,” says journalist Sandra Romandía, who reports the story of one family’s tortured experience after their adult son was kidnapped. They were contacted for ransom, which they paid. Then…silence. For months, there was no word from their son or the kidnappers until they were told that their son’s body might be in a morgue in another state. They gave DNA to the attorney general’s office in their state and tried to follow the official bureaucratic maze to find out the truth. “After spending hours traveling through the country with the knowledge that their hope of waiting to hear from Luis would probably end, the prosecutor’s office said no, there was no body there that matched their information and they should go home. Just like that, as if it was some laundry they had come to pick up and it wasn’t ready.”
They persisted, and eventually were told that yes, there was indeed a corpse that could be Luis, which the DNA results later confirmed.
This is one of thousands of stories behind the statistics. “How can we discuss the disappearances without it becoming just lists of numbers and despair?” asks the host of the podcast “Semanario Gatopardo”, Fernanda Caso, in an episode about female disappearances. These account for approximately 25% of the missing in Mexico.
I too have struggled to find a way in: how to write about a topic so easily sensationalized by the media and so readily dismissed by those in power, or those who feel numbed by the abject litany of loss, myself included.
One of the U.N. report’s many recommendations—ranging from coherent national protocols for law enforcement handling a missing person report to better inter-agency communication—concerns raising awareness and empathy. “There should be a broad national public awareness campaign that reaches all sectors of the population…to combat the stigma faced every day by the victims.”
To me, this means: don’t look away. Don’t “other” the men, women, children who have vanished. See them. Stand witness.
I will divide this into a two-part series: this first part provides an overview of the disappearances and the societal response. The second part will dive into the backlog of unidentified victims, the state of forensic investigation and recent efforts to centralize DNA information in Mexico.
