Mega-projects, drought and loot: this is what Yankee Imperialism demands from Mexico
Feature image: Sheinbaum and AMLO together.
Recently, the Atlantic Council, a US think tank which analyses the necessities of the main imperialist superpower from third-countries to assure the interest of financial capital, has issued a new report on the demands that Yankee imperialism has on Mexico. Among these demands the private foreign investment for mega-projects are the main issues, demanding once again the selling of the land to benefit the imperialist interests.
To do so, they need the lackeys of the ruling classes that assures that these demands are fulfilled, and so the new elections in Mexico have played a major role in it. Recently, Claudia Sheinbaum has been elected as the new President of Mexico, being applauded for being the first women to achieve this position in the history of the country. However, the election of a woman was nothing more than the bureaucratic capitalism washing its hands and trying to sell a new lackey of the imperialist as so-called “progressive”, but she is only the same wolf with another lamb skin.
Claudia Sheinbaum is a “technocrat” linked to Zionism, close to the comprador bourgeoisie and the Republican wing of Yankee imperialism, allied to French and Spanish imperialism in the European Union. She is a blatant opportunist that represents the continuation of the policy of “AMLO” that traffics with the feminine claims with the post-modernist demagoguery of “break the glass ceiling”, the “gender equality, gender agenda, the time of the women”, she even goes further, stealing sentences from the Zapatism (“never more a Mexico without us”). A repugnant servant of the big bourgeoisie and imperialism that will be in charge of the Mexico presidency.
Mexico as the most important “trade partner” of USA
In 2023, Mexico became the most important “trade partner” of the United States. While imperialists and their lackeys try to show this relationship as “equal” or even “good” for Mexico, it only means that the interests of the US as the main and sole hegemonic superpower now have changed and they need that Mexico assures that the needs of the imperialist ruling classes are fulfilled no matter what.
As the Atlantic Council itself writes: “With rising tensions between the United States and
China, nearshoring has become increasingly urgent. One common scenario we heard about often in our conversations is manufacturers looking to move their assembly, testing, and packaging (ATP) plants from China to Mexico.”
So Mexico can be a good “trade partner” for United States because they can provide high rates of profit for the imperialists without risking them due to the political situation in the country because the ruling classes of Mexico are under the dominance of Yankee imperialism and will assure the profits of them at any cost, and for sure at the cost of the interest of its own people. In October 2023, Andrés Manuel López Obrador was the President of Mexico and already paving the path for this situation, gave “finance incentives” to companies investing in sectors that usually manufactured in China and the region, those are semiconductors, electronic components, batteries, motors, fertilizers and pharmaceuticals so they “can” enter Mexico.
Even with this reduction of the taxes and facilities, the imperialists want more investment in the infrastructures of the country, because as the Atlantic Council explains “companies have hesitated in the absence of an assurance of a high return on investment”.
We highlight the case of Monterrey, one of the “industrial cities” in Northern Mexico, near the border with the USA. This city with 5.2 million people in a 40 km radio of the metropolitan area, were 25 per cent are between 25 and 34-years-old people that the bourgeoisie can use as cheap and specialized workers, what according to the think tanks data actually “can reach nearly 6.6 million consumers”. Clearly, this is a very sweet treat for Yankee imperialism, because boosting bureaucratic capitalism it achieves a higher increase of its profits. All this without loosing their political power, because the Mexican State bows down to the necessities of the imperialist bourgeoisie and offers economical and political guarantees.
This “industrial cities”, other examples could be Mexico City, Guadalajara, Querétaro and Guanajuato, are not new, but imperialism already used this same system with the colonial enclaves in China, as Hong Kong or Taiwan were, which were given to British and Japanese imperialism respectively as colonies. This cities, even formally owned by the semi-feudal and semi-colonial country as Mexico or China in that moment, in practice are purely owned by the dominant imperialism because the policy of the imperialist bourgeoisie rules. This way, a balkanization is promoted and the subjugation of the countries is easier for imperialism.
A proof of this blatant submission is, for example, the great amount of economical and legal aid that the companies that “invest in the area” acquire. Hence, the investment of the bourgeoisie is reduced to a minimum, nearly a gift, this is payed by the public coffers of the State, it is, from the taxes on the people. This cash incentives that are given upon or after “create” a certain amount of job positions – again, mainly the imperialist bourgeoisie profits from it – are for the expenses in land purchase, reform or leasing of facilities or construction, agreements with power supply, connection fees for natural gas, LP or water, industrial equipment and technology acquisition, in addition to reduce payroll tax and scholarships for training, discounts in border tolls, aid when founding suppliers, assistance of the public institution of resources such as electricity, water, in searching employees and expedition of all procedures. Basically, the Mexican State has gifted a piece of their land to the imperialist bourgeoisie so they can, as soon as possibly, exploit their people.
The necessity of mega-projects for the imperialists, not for the people
As Mexican comrades have denounce before, mega-projects as the Maya Train or the Interoceanic Corridor of Isthmus of Tehuantepec has not only not fulfilled the interests of the people, but they have caused death and destruction to the peasantry of the rural areas who defended their lands against the imperialist invasion. Even though, the puppet rulers of Mexico have taken position for the imperialist and have continued this war against the people, expending millions of pesos in the interests of the imperialist and monopolistic companies while the democratic rights of the deepest and broadest masses are one time after another attacked and erased.
Now, the imperialists demands to continue deepening in these mega-projects but also that the government assures the implementation of them despite the popular resistance and combativeness. Sheinbaum has already done the first steps in this issue. To calm the possible investors, she has kept the former Finance Minister and director of Ecanal, a private company that makes macroeconomic analysis on Mexico to the imperialists that invest in Mexico. Few days after the election of Sheinbaum, he made a public declaration assuring the investors that the new government would be committed to “macroeconomic stability” and “fiscal prudence”.
An improvement of land and river transportation, in addition to an improvement of the border is a necessity of Yankee imperialists if they want to reduce the transportation costs. Among their demands, a most technological infrastructure that can assure a more “fluent” transportation is necessary, because even minutes of delays causes thousands of “losses” in their profits. So, they demand that Mexico not only invests millions in updating the border USA-Mexico with X-Ray technology and the highroads to shorten the routes, but also that Mexico puts more resources to reduce the illegal flow of activities such as weapons, drugs or people. However, from the 17 millions of non-registered weapons in Mexico, the majority of them come from United States, which is the greatest weapon market in the world and Yankee imperialism needs the drugs to be able to drug and keep under control their own people, which 1 out of 6 have drug addiction issues. Shamelessly, they blame the illegal entry of people into the USA as the main cause of the disrupting cross-border activity, and so they demand to increase the security measures to assure the minimum contraband but the better flow in the transport. So, Yankee imperialism not only needs more infrastructure, but also the puppet ruling classes which continues the war against the people to prevent border problems that can affect their economic interests.
In addition, Yankee imperialism demands a cheap and unlimited access to energy and water supplies. In a country were blackouts and droughts are the daily life of the poorest States of Mexico, mostly on southern Mexico, the imperialists want cheap and unlimited of these important resources which are not always available for the people. To do so, they demand more private “investment” in renewable energy that can drop the prices, together with pipelines to implement storage of the natural gas they buy from the US.
Also water is a key factor that the companies need in order to assure their high profits. Even though Northern Mexico has suffered several droughts that have caused death and Southern Mexico suffered severe rainfalls that has affected the water supply to the people, the imperialists needs that the Governments of the different States of Mexico assure their water supply no matter the circumstance, killing the crops of the peasants. Periódico Mural has previously reported on Oaxaca, where the drought situation led into the stop of the activities of a Hospital due to the lack of water to carry on the work. Similar situation happened with six schools of poor areas that are not assisted by the State infrastructure, but by private companies that inflates the prices. But, international and tourism-related companies as spas, hotels, soft drinks and beer factories continued to work as usual.
Sheinbaum as AMLO, puppets of imperialists
The imperialist rule is legitimated through the ruling classes of the semi-feudal and semi-colonial country, who is in charge to assure the foreign interests at any cost. Through this article we have denounced several political actions that the former president of Mexico, Andrés Manuel López Obrador did to assure them. Now, is the turn of Claudia Sheinbaum to fulfill her tasks as the country-seller.
This so-called “deepening of the trade relationships” will not only affect the deepest and broadest masses of the countryside, but also the workers of the cities, who will have to confront the attempt to backward their labor and educational rights. “Similar concerns surround Mexico’s labor laws and inadequate enforcement of internationally recognized rights—including the formation of unions, competitive wages, and safe working conditions—that could result in targeted tariffs, if not complete bans on noncompliant companies’ goods entering the US market.” reads the document of the Atlantic Council.
This comes in addition to a full-change in education demand for the lack of specialized workers in the today’s needs of imperialism, that is semiconductors and other related technology. To do so they demand shorter and more specialized studies that also reduces the salaries of the workers due to the less qualified education needed for the work.
These are all demands by Yankee imperialism, on which earlier AMLO, now Sheinbaum will have to face the combativeness of the Mexican people. We have previously reported on the combative actions of the teacher’s union CNTE, which has carried out a strike and a boycott campaign together with Current of the People Red Sun.
The fact that Mexico has become the “first trade partner” of United States only means more national submission, more super-exploitation for the proletariat and the people, more severe plundering of the peasants from the lands they work, more ruin to the petty bourgeoisie and a stronger pressure of the monopolies over the national bourgeoisie; so this fact develops even more the conditions to the victorious development of the New Democracy revolution.
