In a shocking act at 4:40 p.m. on December 29, workers from the defunct Notimex took down the strike flags, after 1,408 days of fighting for their labor rights, “without defeat” but under protest, said Adriana Urrea. Towers.
At the same time, the 3 camps were set up, where they supported the movement, with the support of numerous organizations, but legally supported by the Telephone Workers Union of the Mexican Republic, from where the negotiation, agreements and liquidation were carried out.
The leader who led one of the longest strikes in Mexican labor history announced, with a broken voice, that at least 100 workers were liquidated this Friday morning in accordance with the law, “that was the condition for lifting the strike.”
He immediately announced that the Single Union of Notimex Workers (SUTNOTIMEX) is not disappearing, it is being transformed into an industry union “for the defense of media workers.”
He also reported that the strikers, now liquidated according to their Collective Contract and individual rights, will launch a new journalistic company to make workers’ and women’s struggles visible, which could be a cooperative.
He said that the workers, 80 percent of whom supported the movement, have already spoken with the two pre-candidates for the Presidency of the Republic to demand that the next government straighten out the country’s labor policy, since the example of what happened in Notimex is one among hundreds, where workers are illegally treated.
He spoke to dozens of journalists who were in the camp from 1 p.m. and in the presence of unions, social leaders and political parties, who supported the strike that “the curtain came down” in one of the autonomous companies of the State, under the pretext that there was corruption in the union, but that so far nothing has been proven and instead “they violated our labor rights, our human rights and we were persecuted, threatened.”
Emotional, but firm, she added that “we lost 3 years and 10 months of salary, security, some lives due to lack of medical care, but not our dignity.”
He affirmed that the disappearance, by decree, above the law, of Notimex is the result of the terrible performance of San Juana Martínez Montemayor, a journalist director who since 2020 violated the Contract “that spent the budget of Notimex, assigned by the Chamber of Deputies during 2020, 2021, 2022 and 2023, without the agency having worked, and that is not explained, so “we demand audit, justice and that this does not go unpunished.”
At a press conference, in the Baja California 200 camp in the Roma neighborhood, amidst slogans and applause, Urrea Torres stated that this strike is an unprecedented event, whose experience will be useful to media workers, professionals most precarious in the country.
Therefore, by converting Sutnotimex into an industrial union, in the field of communication and journalism, it will be able to support the union, but not only, he said, many rural workers, workers in general, to work for a new labor policy. .
In the same sense, the company they intend to build will be a communication company that makes visible the problems of workers that are hidden in everyday information. There are many conflicts that are not seen, are not known, he said.
He also said that President Andrés López Obrador’s decision to close the state company that informed the world about Mexico for 55 years was a decision that harmed the State, violated the human rights of more than 300 workers and was based on lies. that there was corruption and poor professional performance there. “A lie”.
“None of that could be proven and instead from the beginning the right to strike was violated and dialogue and negotiation were systematically denied.”
He completely rejected the argument that Notimex fulfilled the mission for which it was created and that it was replaced by the morning conference, since the work of the parastatal went beyond the official communication carried out by the president and his social communication team every day.
He explained that the workers sought in different ways to defend their source of employment, their labor and human rights violated by Martínez Montemayor and his work team to find a solution to the conflict and subsequently reverse the decision of the head of the Federal Executive. “It couldn’t be done,” he said.
We deeply regret that as a solution to the labor conflict caused by the terrible management of Sanjuana Martínez, the federal government decided to extinguish the autonomous organization and in this scenario “we demand that the processes planned to compensate for violations of workers’ rights in matters be complied with. collective and individual.”
Some adjustments are still pending, which depends on the Institute to Return What was Stolen to the People, responsible for liquidating the decentralized body, also responsible for taking care of public assets and guaranteeing full respect for the rights of workers.
At the conference he took the opportunity to thank the support that this 46-month strike had, both in Mexico and internationally.