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Judi Lynn
Judi Lynn's Journal
Judi Lynn's Journal
February 17, 2020
A Century of U.S. Intervention Created the Immigration Crisis
A Century of U.S. Intervention Created the Immigration Crisis
Those seeking asylum today inherited a series of crises that drove them to the border
Mark Tseng-Putterman
Follow
Jun 20, 2018 · 10 min read
A national spotlight now shines on the border between the United States and Mexico, where heartbreaking images of Central American children being separated from their parents and held in cages demonstrate the consequences of the Trump administration’s “zero-tolerance policy” on unauthorized entry into the country, announced in May 2018. Under intense international scrutiny, Trump has now signed an executive order that will keep families detained at the border together, though it is unclear when the more than 2,300 children already separated from their guardians will be returned.
. . .
At the margins of the mainstream discursive stalemate over immigration lies over a century of historical U.S. intervention that politicians and pundits on both sides of the aisle seem determined to silence. Since Theodore Roosevelt in 1904 declared the U.S.’s right to exercise an “international police power” in Latin America, the U.S. has cut deep wounds throughout the region, leaving scars that will last for generations to come. This history of intervention is inextricable from the contemporary Central American crisis of internal and international displacement and migration.
The liberal rhetoric of inclusion and common humanity is insufficient: we must also acknowledge the role that a century of U.S.-backed military coups, corporate plundering, and neoliberal sapping of resources has played in the poverty, instability, and violence that now drives people from Guatemala, El Salvador, and Honduras toward Mexico and the United States. For decades, U.S. policies of military intervention and economic neoliberalism have undermined democracy and stability in the region, creating vacuums of power in which drug cartels and paramilitary alliances have risen. In the past fifteen years alone, CAFTA-DR — a free trade agreement between the U.S. and five Central American countries as well as the Dominican Republic — has restructured the region’s economy and guaranteed economic dependence on the United States through massive trade imbalances and the influx of American agricultural and industrial goods that weaken domestic industries. Yet there are few connections being drawn between the weakening of Central American rural agricultural economies at the hands of CAFTA and the rise in migration from the region in the years since. In general, the U.S. takes no responsibility for the conditions that drive Central American migrants to the border.
U.S. empire thrives on amnesia. The Trump administration cannot remember what it said last week, let alone the actions of presidential administrations long gone that sowed the seeds of today’s immigration crisis. There can be no common-sense immigration “debate” that conveniently ignores the history of U.S. intervention in Central America. Insisting on American values of inclusion and integration only bolsters the very myth of American exceptionalism, a narrative that has erased this nation’s imperial pursuits for over a century.
More:
https://medium.com/s/story/timeline-us-intervention-central-america-a9bea9ebc148
February 17, 2020
15.FEB.2020 . 6 MIN READ
On September 11, 1980, General Augusto Pinochet, head of the authoritarian military junta that staged a coup d’état in Chile, arranged a national plebiscite to ratify a new constitution. The referendum, approved by 67 percent of the population, served to solidify Pinochet’s position as President of the Republic of Chile and give more legitimacy to his authoritarian regime. Violence and human rights violations became the status quo, and political activity was completely repressed.
Fast forward 40 years, to February 2020. The democratic government of Chile has agreed to hold a new national referendum in April. This time, it will ask the people of Chile if they want to get rid of the constitution of 1980, drafting a new one based on public participation, social inclusion, and increased social welfare. The decision comes after months of widespread protests and violence have shaken one of the region’s most stable countries. Why did it take so long for this essential agreement to be reached? How has Pinochet’s authoritarian legacy survived for so long, after transition to democracy, in a state that just wanted to move on?
The 1980 constitution was a way to increase political stability and avoid radical change, which explains why Chile has seen very little social reform in the past 40 years. Preserving the status quo and avoiding drastic reform has long been the key to avoiding the political chaos of the 1970s, and military officials maintained an essential role in the Chilean government to protect the legacies of the junta. Today, a new generation of Chileans is asking for change—change of the kind only a new constitution can provide.
Historical Context: Pinochet’s Dictatorship and the 1980 Referendum
Pinochet and the military junta established an authoritarian regime on September 11, 1973, after overthrowing socialist President Salvador Allende and his Popular Unity government. Two principles guided the new regime. The first was a complete depoliticization of society, achieved through repression, intimidation, and persecution of any opposition to the regime; political parties were banned, national electoral registries burned, and local governments and universities restructured. The second was a strict free-market economy based on prioritizing exports, the privatization of government social welfare programs, and private property.
More:
https://hir.harvard.edu/from-dictatorship-to-democracy/
From Dictatorship to Democracy: Chile's Outdated Constitution
15.FEB.2020 . 6 MIN READ
On September 11, 1980, General Augusto Pinochet, head of the authoritarian military junta that staged a coup d’état in Chile, arranged a national plebiscite to ratify a new constitution. The referendum, approved by 67 percent of the population, served to solidify Pinochet’s position as President of the Republic of Chile and give more legitimacy to his authoritarian regime. Violence and human rights violations became the status quo, and political activity was completely repressed.
Fast forward 40 years, to February 2020. The democratic government of Chile has agreed to hold a new national referendum in April. This time, it will ask the people of Chile if they want to get rid of the constitution of 1980, drafting a new one based on public participation, social inclusion, and increased social welfare. The decision comes after months of widespread protests and violence have shaken one of the region’s most stable countries. Why did it take so long for this essential agreement to be reached? How has Pinochet’s authoritarian legacy survived for so long, after transition to democracy, in a state that just wanted to move on?
The 1980 constitution was a way to increase political stability and avoid radical change, which explains why Chile has seen very little social reform in the past 40 years. Preserving the status quo and avoiding drastic reform has long been the key to avoiding the political chaos of the 1970s, and military officials maintained an essential role in the Chilean government to protect the legacies of the junta. Today, a new generation of Chileans is asking for change—change of the kind only a new constitution can provide.
Historical Context: Pinochet’s Dictatorship and the 1980 Referendum
Pinochet and the military junta established an authoritarian regime on September 11, 1973, after overthrowing socialist President Salvador Allende and his Popular Unity government. Two principles guided the new regime. The first was a complete depoliticization of society, achieved through repression, intimidation, and persecution of any opposition to the regime; political parties were banned, national electoral registries burned, and local governments and universities restructured. The second was a strict free-market economy based on prioritizing exports, the privatization of government social welfare programs, and private property.
More:
https://hir.harvard.edu/from-dictatorship-to-democracy/
February 16, 2020
15 February 2020
by: Andrea Korte
Babies begin to relate to others through touch from their earliest days – connections that have implications for their health and their social development well beyond infancy, particularly their ability to empathize with others, according to several scientists.
“Very young babies can look out at other people’s bodies moving and can relate the same biological movement to their own felt movement,” which is a “bedrock” for social development, said Andrew Meltzoff, co-director of the Institute for Learning and Brain Sciences at the University of Washington.
This connection between babies and their caregivers “provides the foundation for the capacity of empathy,” said Ruth Feldman, professor of developmental social neuroscience at the Interdisciplinary Center Herzliya in Israel. “The more they experience this synchrony, the more they are able to develop empathy later on.”
Meltzoff and Feldman shared results from their work at a Feb. 15 news briefing at the 2020 American Association for the Advancement of Science Annual Meeting in Seattle. They were joined at the presentation by Minoru Asada, professor at the Open and Transdisciplinary Research Institute at Osaka University, where he explores whether the sense of touch could serve as a basis for empathy in robots.
More:
https://www.aaas.org/news/touch-babies-provides-foundation-empathy
Touch in Babies Provides a Foundation for Empathy
15 February 2020
by: Andrea Korte
Babies begin to relate to others through touch from their earliest days – connections that have implications for their health and their social development well beyond infancy, particularly their ability to empathize with others, according to several scientists.
“Very young babies can look out at other people’s bodies moving and can relate the same biological movement to their own felt movement,” which is a “bedrock” for social development, said Andrew Meltzoff, co-director of the Institute for Learning and Brain Sciences at the University of Washington.
This connection between babies and their caregivers “provides the foundation for the capacity of empathy,” said Ruth Feldman, professor of developmental social neuroscience at the Interdisciplinary Center Herzliya in Israel. “The more they experience this synchrony, the more they are able to develop empathy later on.”
Meltzoff and Feldman shared results from their work at a Feb. 15 news briefing at the 2020 American Association for the Advancement of Science Annual Meeting in Seattle. They were joined at the presentation by Minoru Asada, professor at the Open and Transdisciplinary Research Institute at Osaka University, where he explores whether the sense of touch could serve as a basis for empathy in robots.
More:
https://www.aaas.org/news/touch-babies-provides-foundation-empathy
February 16, 2020
00:15, 16.02.2020
US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said Washington is leading a coalition to oust Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro, TASS reported.
The US supports the efforts of the Organization of American States in reviving its institutions, mandate, and increasing efficiency, said Pompeo at the Munich Security Conference on Saturday.
According to him, they are leading a coalition of 59 countries to overthrow Maduro and respect the will of the Venezuelan people.
The situation in Venezuela escalated after January 23, 2019, opposition leader Juan Guaidó, whose appointment to the post of speaker of the parliament two days earlier, was canceled by the Supreme Court, declared himself acting president. The US recognized him as the interim head of state.
More:
https://news.am/eng/news/560582.html
Armenia News
Pompeo believes Washington leads coalition to overthrow Maduro
00:15, 16.02.2020
US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said Washington is leading a coalition to oust Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro, TASS reported.
The US supports the efforts of the Organization of American States in reviving its institutions, mandate, and increasing efficiency, said Pompeo at the Munich Security Conference on Saturday.
According to him, they are leading a coalition of 59 countries to overthrow Maduro and respect the will of the Venezuelan people.
The situation in Venezuela escalated after January 23, 2019, opposition leader Juan Guaidó, whose appointment to the post of speaker of the parliament two days earlier, was canceled by the Supreme Court, declared himself acting president. The US recognized him as the interim head of state.
More:
https://news.am/eng/news/560582.html
Armenia News
February 16, 2020
FILE – In this June 16, 2004 file photo, a couple walks by a mural in downtown Guatemala City, on the 50th anniversary of a CIA-backed military intervention in 1954 that ousted leftist President Jacobo Arbenz in Guatemala. Four years later, a military insurrection gave way to what later became a guerrilla movement that for 36 years tried to overthrow the military regimes that ruled Guatemala until well into the 80’s. (AP photo/Rodrigo Abd, File)
By SUZANNE SINGER |
PUBLISHED: February 15, 2020 at 8:33 p.m. | UPDATED: February 15, 2020 at 8:33 p.m.
. . .
I was in Guatemala learning about the Guatemalan civil war and the “Silent Holocaust,” the killing and disappearance of 200,000 Guatemalans, mostly Mayan civilians, the displacement of 1.5 million and the destruction of over 600 indigenous villages. These were the result of the Guatemalan military’s scorched-earth policy during 36 years of civil war. And although a peace treaty was signed in 1996, justice has still not been served, as nearly all those guilty of these crimes against humanity have gone unpunished.
. . .
Aside from feeling compassion for the suffering of any human being, why should anyone in the Inland Empire care about this faraway land? Don’t we have enough problems here in the U.S.? The answer is simple: We are deeply implicated in the Guatemalan situation. In the 1950s, that country’s president, Jacobo Arbenz, tried to create a fairer society by giving indigenous Guatemalans access to their ancestors’ lands. The United Fruit Company, whose land was at stake, enlisted the State Department and the CIA to back a coup that overthrew Arbenz, installing the first in a series of brutal military dictatorships. The bloody year civil war ensued.
Guatemala still endures the after-effects of U.S. intervention: 5% of the population owns 80% of the land. Mayans make up over half the population, yet they have almost no representation in the government and are subject to intense discrimination. And foreign companies and members of the ruling elite continue to displace the rural population to make way for mining sites, dams and agricultural estates.
More:
https://www.ocregister.com/2020/02/15/the-dark-legacy-of-us-intervention-in-guatemala/
The dark legacy of US intervention in Guatemala
FILE – In this June 16, 2004 file photo, a couple walks by a mural in downtown Guatemala City, on the 50th anniversary of a CIA-backed military intervention in 1954 that ousted leftist President Jacobo Arbenz in Guatemala. Four years later, a military insurrection gave way to what later became a guerrilla movement that for 36 years tried to overthrow the military regimes that ruled Guatemala until well into the 80’s. (AP photo/Rodrigo Abd, File)
By SUZANNE SINGER |
PUBLISHED: February 15, 2020 at 8:33 p.m. | UPDATED: February 15, 2020 at 8:33 p.m.
. . .
I was in Guatemala learning about the Guatemalan civil war and the “Silent Holocaust,” the killing and disappearance of 200,000 Guatemalans, mostly Mayan civilians, the displacement of 1.5 million and the destruction of over 600 indigenous villages. These were the result of the Guatemalan military’s scorched-earth policy during 36 years of civil war. And although a peace treaty was signed in 1996, justice has still not been served, as nearly all those guilty of these crimes against humanity have gone unpunished.
. . .
Aside from feeling compassion for the suffering of any human being, why should anyone in the Inland Empire care about this faraway land? Don’t we have enough problems here in the U.S.? The answer is simple: We are deeply implicated in the Guatemalan situation. In the 1950s, that country’s president, Jacobo Arbenz, tried to create a fairer society by giving indigenous Guatemalans access to their ancestors’ lands. The United Fruit Company, whose land was at stake, enlisted the State Department and the CIA to back a coup that overthrew Arbenz, installing the first in a series of brutal military dictatorships. The bloody year civil war ensued.
Guatemala still endures the after-effects of U.S. intervention: 5% of the population owns 80% of the land. Mayans make up over half the population, yet they have almost no representation in the government and are subject to intense discrimination. And foreign companies and members of the ruling elite continue to displace the rural population to make way for mining sites, dams and agricultural estates.
More:
https://www.ocregister.com/2020/02/15/the-dark-legacy-of-us-intervention-in-guatemala/
February 14, 2020
Nun was killed in an ambush in the PDS (Sustainable Development Project) area in the Esperança settlement
Feb.12.2020 12:11PM
Cristiano Cipriano Pombo
SÃO PAULO
Fifteen years ago, the American nun Dorothy Mae Stang was shot to death at the age of 73 in Anapu, Pará.
The missionary was killed with six shots, in an ambush, in the area of the PDS (Sustainable Development Project) in the Esperança settlement.
Dorothy had Brazilian citizenship and worked with the CPT (Pastoral Land Commission), an arm of the Catholic Church that works with rural workers. Two men approached her at a farmers' meeting in Anapu, on February 12, 2005.
File Photo- Dorothy May Stang, (Carlos Silva/Divulgação) - Divulgação
"Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for justice because they will be fed up." So, with the Bible in hand, Dorothy Stang read to her killers the passage - and two others - before she was shot. When asked if she was armed, she displayed the Bible and said it was her "only weapon."
An eyewitness recounted the crime scene to Folha. The person also said that there was an argument.
Dorothy asked them not to plant grass in the PDS, as it disturbed the settlers' gardens. Clodoaldo Carlos Batista, Eduardo, replied that if she uprooted the grass they planted, it would put lives at risk. Rayfran das Neves Sales, Fogoió, then stepped away and shot her.
More:
https://www1.folha.uol.com.br/internacional/en/brazil/2020/02/15-years-ago-missionary-dorothy-stang-73-was-murdered-in-para.shtml
15 Years Ago, Missionary Dorothy Stang, 73, Was Murdered in Par
Nun was killed in an ambush in the PDS (Sustainable Development Project) area in the Esperança settlement
Feb.12.2020 12:11PM
Cristiano Cipriano Pombo
SÃO PAULO
Fifteen years ago, the American nun Dorothy Mae Stang was shot to death at the age of 73 in Anapu, Pará.
The missionary was killed with six shots, in an ambush, in the area of the PDS (Sustainable Development Project) in the Esperança settlement.
Dorothy had Brazilian citizenship and worked with the CPT (Pastoral Land Commission), an arm of the Catholic Church that works with rural workers. Two men approached her at a farmers' meeting in Anapu, on February 12, 2005.
File Photo- Dorothy May Stang, (Carlos Silva/Divulgação) - Divulgação
"Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for justice because they will be fed up." So, with the Bible in hand, Dorothy Stang read to her killers the passage - and two others - before she was shot. When asked if she was armed, she displayed the Bible and said it was her "only weapon."
An eyewitness recounted the crime scene to Folha. The person also said that there was an argument.
Dorothy asked them not to plant grass in the PDS, as it disturbed the settlers' gardens. Clodoaldo Carlos Batista, Eduardo, replied that if she uprooted the grass they planted, it would put lives at risk. Rayfran das Neves Sales, Fogoió, then stepped away and shot her.
More:
https://www1.folha.uol.com.br/internacional/en/brazil/2020/02/15-years-ago-missionary-dorothy-stang-73-was-murdered-in-para.shtml
February 14, 2020
Senator asks that his cremation be prevented; A judge has already banned the ceremony
Feb.13.2020 10:07AM
RIO DE JANEIRO
Senator Flávio Bolsonaro spoke for the first time this Wednesday (12) about the death of former PM captain Adriano da Nóbrega and asked that the body not be cremated and that the case be clarified.
It is the first public statement by the family of President Jair Bolsonaro about the death of the former PM, accused of being part of a group of professional assassins, leading a militia, and being a partner in the misdemeanor in Rio de Janeiro.
Adriano Magalhães da Nóbrega. Foto: Divulgação / Polícia Civil
A fugitive for more than a year, the former police officer linked to Flávio was killed on Sunday (9) in a joint operation by the Bahian and Rio de Janeiro police in Esplanada (a city 170 km from Salvador).
Adrian's death exposes a series of doubts about the network that supported him and about the official version of his death.
More:
https://www1.folha.uol.com.br/internacional/en/brazil/2020/02/flavio-bolsonaro-speaks-out-about-militiamans-death.shtml
Senator asks that his cremation be prevented; A judge has already banned the ceremony
Senator asks that his cremation be prevented; A judge has already banned the ceremony
Feb.13.2020 10:07AM
RIO DE JANEIRO
Senator Flávio Bolsonaro spoke for the first time this Wednesday (12) about the death of former PM captain Adriano da Nóbrega and asked that the body not be cremated and that the case be clarified.
It is the first public statement by the family of President Jair Bolsonaro about the death of the former PM, accused of being part of a group of professional assassins, leading a militia, and being a partner in the misdemeanor in Rio de Janeiro.
Adriano Magalhães da Nóbrega. Foto: Divulgação / Polícia Civil
A fugitive for more than a year, the former police officer linked to Flávio was killed on Sunday (9) in a joint operation by the Bahian and Rio de Janeiro police in Esplanada (a city 170 km from Salvador).
Adrian's death exposes a series of doubts about the network that supported him and about the official version of his death.
More:
https://www1.folha.uol.com.br/internacional/en/brazil/2020/02/flavio-bolsonaro-speaks-out-about-militiamans-death.shtml
February 10, 2020
by Adriaan Alsema February 9, 2020
School teachers throughout Colombia went into panic mode on Saturday after a teacher from the northeast was assassinated and 25 received death threats in a war-torn village in the north.
Teacher Sandra Mayerly Baquero was assassinated in the northeastern Arauca province on Friday, the same day that classes were suspended in El Salado, a war-torn village in the northern Atlantico Province.
After teachers’ union Fecode had rung the alarm, a teacher and union representative survived an assassination attempt in the central Tolima province.
The union fiercely criticized the inaction of the government of President Ivan Duque and the consistent stigmatization of his far-right Democratic Center party that has claimed teachers are “indoctrinating” public school children with leftist political thought.
More:
https://colombiareports.com/colombias-teachers-ring-alarm-after-one-assassinated-25-threatened-in-24-hours/
Colombia's teachers ring alarm after one assassinated, 25 threatened in 24 hours
by Adriaan Alsema February 9, 2020
School teachers throughout Colombia went into panic mode on Saturday after a teacher from the northeast was assassinated and 25 received death threats in a war-torn village in the north.
Teacher Sandra Mayerly Baquero was assassinated in the northeastern Arauca province on Friday, the same day that classes were suspended in El Salado, a war-torn village in the northern Atlantico Province.
After teachers’ union Fecode had rung the alarm, a teacher and union representative survived an assassination attempt in the central Tolima province.
More than 1579 teachers murdered in 60 years, in the face of the indolence of the State that continues its policy of denying the paramilitary structures that reign in the regions that only teachers can reach with hope.
Teachers union Fecode
The union fiercely criticized the inaction of the government of President Ivan Duque and the consistent stigmatization of his far-right Democratic Center party that has claimed teachers are “indoctrinating” public school children with leftist political thought.
More:
https://colombiareports.com/colombias-teachers-ring-alarm-after-one-assassinated-25-threatened-in-24-hours/
February 10, 2020
Brazil’s president was accused of kowtowing with his 73-minute Facebook live stream but some see method in his obsequiousness
Tom Phillips Latin America correspondent
Fri 7 Feb 2020 12.56 EST
He has long styled himself as a tropical Trump – a socialist-skewering hardman fighting Brazilian carnage.
But in recent weeks Brazil’s far-right president, Jair Bolsonaro, has taken his fixation with the US leader to new heights, livestreaming himself on Facebook as he watched his political idol in action.
The latest such appearance came on Thursday as Trump celebrated his acquittal by the Senate in his impeachment trial with a vitriolic and vulgar address to the nation.
More than 4,000 miles to the south, at the heart of Brazil’s very own political swamp, Bolsonaro sat down to watch – filming himself viewing Trump’s entire hour-long address and offering the occasional aside to the camera, hailing his North American hero or berating foes in politics and the press.
More:
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/feb/07/jair-bolsonaro-video-watching-trump-rant
His master's voice? Jair Bolsonaro posts video of himself watching Trump rant
Brazil’s president was accused of kowtowing with his 73-minute Facebook live stream but some see method in his obsequiousness
Tom Phillips Latin America correspondent
Fri 7 Feb 2020 12.56 EST
He has long styled himself as a tropical Trump – a socialist-skewering hardman fighting Brazilian carnage.
But in recent weeks Brazil’s far-right president, Jair Bolsonaro, has taken his fixation with the US leader to new heights, livestreaming himself on Facebook as he watched his political idol in action.
The latest such appearance came on Thursday as Trump celebrated his acquittal by the Senate in his impeachment trial with a vitriolic and vulgar address to the nation.
More than 4,000 miles to the south, at the heart of Brazil’s very own political swamp, Bolsonaro sat down to watch – filming himself viewing Trump’s entire hour-long address and offering the occasional aside to the camera, hailing his North American hero or berating foes in politics and the press.
More:
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/feb/07/jair-bolsonaro-video-watching-trump-rant
February 9, 2020
by Ellen Brown / February 8th, 2020
While U.S. advocates and local politicians struggle to get their first public banks chartered, Mexico’s new president has begun construction on 2,700 branches of a government-owned bank to be completed in 2021, when it will be the largest bank in the country. At a press conference on January 6, he said the neoliberal model had failed; private banks were not serving the poor and people outside the cities, so the government had to step in.
Andrés Manuel López Obrador (known as AMLO) has been compared to the United Kingdom’s left-wing opposition leader Jeremy Corbyn, with one notable difference: AMLO is now in power. He and his left-wing coalition won by a landslide in Mexico’s 2018 general election, overturning the Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI) that had ruled the country for much of the past century. Called Mexico’s “first full-fledged left-wing experiment,” AMLO’s election marks a dramatic change in the political direction of the country. AMLO wrote in his 2018 book A New Hope for Mexico: “In Mexico the governing class constitutes a gang of plunderers…. Mexico will not grow strong if our public institutions remain at the service of the wealthy elites.”
The new president has held to his campaign promises. In 2019, his first year in office, he did what Donald Trump pledged to do — “drain the swamp” — purging the government of technocrats and institutions he considered corrupt, profligate or impeding the transformation of Mexico after 36 years of failed market-focused neoliberal policies. Other accomplishments have included substantially increasing the minimum wage while cutting top government salaries and oversize pensions; making small loans and grants directly to farmers; guaranteeing crop prices for key agricultural crops; launching programs to benefit youth, the disabled and the elderly; and initiating a $44 billion infrastructure plan. López Obrador’s goal, he says, is to construct a “new paradigm” in economic policy that improves human welfare, not just increases gross domestic product.
The End of the Neoliberal Era
To deliver on that promise, in July 2019 AMLO converted the publicly owned federal savings bank Bansefi into a “Bank of the Poor” (Banco del Bienestar or “Welfare Bank”). He said on January 6 that the neoliberal era had eliminated all the state-owned banks but one, which he had gotten approval to expand with 2,700 new branches. Added to the existing 538 branches of the former Bansefi, that will bring the total in two years to 3,238 branches, far outstripping any other bank in the country. (Banco Azteca, currently the largest by number of branches, has 1,860.) Digital banking will also be developed. Speaking to a local group in December, AMLO said his goal was for the Bank of the Poor to reach 13,000 branches, more than all the private banks in the country combined.
More:
https://dissidentvoice.org/2020/02/mexicos-president-amlo-shows-how-its-done/
Mexico's President AMLO Shows How It's Done
by Ellen Brown / February 8th, 2020
While U.S. advocates and local politicians struggle to get their first public banks chartered, Mexico’s new president has begun construction on 2,700 branches of a government-owned bank to be completed in 2021, when it will be the largest bank in the country. At a press conference on January 6, he said the neoliberal model had failed; private banks were not serving the poor and people outside the cities, so the government had to step in.
Andrés Manuel López Obrador (known as AMLO) has been compared to the United Kingdom’s left-wing opposition leader Jeremy Corbyn, with one notable difference: AMLO is now in power. He and his left-wing coalition won by a landslide in Mexico’s 2018 general election, overturning the Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI) that had ruled the country for much of the past century. Called Mexico’s “first full-fledged left-wing experiment,” AMLO’s election marks a dramatic change in the political direction of the country. AMLO wrote in his 2018 book A New Hope for Mexico: “In Mexico the governing class constitutes a gang of plunderers…. Mexico will not grow strong if our public institutions remain at the service of the wealthy elites.”
The new president has held to his campaign promises. In 2019, his first year in office, he did what Donald Trump pledged to do — “drain the swamp” — purging the government of technocrats and institutions he considered corrupt, profligate or impeding the transformation of Mexico after 36 years of failed market-focused neoliberal policies. Other accomplishments have included substantially increasing the minimum wage while cutting top government salaries and oversize pensions; making small loans and grants directly to farmers; guaranteeing crop prices for key agricultural crops; launching programs to benefit youth, the disabled and the elderly; and initiating a $44 billion infrastructure plan. López Obrador’s goal, he says, is to construct a “new paradigm” in economic policy that improves human welfare, not just increases gross domestic product.
The End of the Neoliberal Era
To deliver on that promise, in July 2019 AMLO converted the publicly owned federal savings bank Bansefi into a “Bank of the Poor” (Banco del Bienestar or “Welfare Bank”). He said on January 6 that the neoliberal era had eliminated all the state-owned banks but one, which he had gotten approval to expand with 2,700 new branches. Added to the existing 538 branches of the former Bansefi, that will bring the total in two years to 3,238 branches, far outstripping any other bank in the country. (Banco Azteca, currently the largest by number of branches, has 1,860.) Digital banking will also be developed. Speaking to a local group in December, AMLO said his goal was for the Bank of the Poor to reach 13,000 branches, more than all the private banks in the country combined.
More:
https://dissidentvoice.org/2020/02/mexicos-president-amlo-shows-how-its-done/
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