In Mexico City, a strike by lecturers in the National Autonomous University of Mexico (UNAM) is underway. We have been sent this interview by a reader in Mexico, of Viridiana, one of the striking teachers and head of supervised work at UNAM.
You are involved in the strike within the science department. Can you explain the reasons that pushed the teachers into action?
I am a professor of Mathematics. At UNAM, three quarters of lecturers practice under this status. Our contracts can be renewed from semester to semester, or they may not be renewed. We are therefore in a precarious situation. In addition, we have lower salaries than ‘full’ professors.
In the context of Covid, a problem that has been latent for several years has now taken on unbearable proportions. This is a problem concerning the pay that affects the whole university and in particular the science department where I work.
There is a law in Mexico that prohibits employers from paying wages several months late. Well, UNAM does not respect the law! We are not paid for several months. Before, we were paid six months late at most, but now it can be eight or nine months or even a year late! But that’s not all. It was realized that when the salaries were paid, it might be lower than it should be. There is therefore a second violation of the law. In my case, I was supposed to get 20,000 pesos, and I only received 3,000!
The authorities are using Covid as a pretext and they explain the administrative delays by ‘teleworking’ and ‘sick leave’ linked to the pandemic. But we know from experience that this is a practice that has been going on for years, especially in the Faculty of Science. With Covid, the problem has just grew in magnitude.
It is for this reason that a movement was launched in March 2021. Teachers have stopped work but officially we cannot speak of a ‘strike.’ Here, the UNAM unions are charro, or “yellow unions”, at the service of the university management. They claim that the problem will soon be solved, and they minimize it. For the movement to be recognized as a strike, unions would have to file a strike notice, but they did not. We stopped working anyway, with the support of the students. The University is completely paralyzed…but there is no strike!
How did management react?
The management of the university has tried on several levels to weaken the movement. The strikers were treated to a speech that made people feel guilty. The management has also appealed to the ‘Constitution’ and the ‘right to education’ to discredit those teachers who are in favour of stopping classes.
There was also a campaign of intimidation among the students, explaining to them that if the movement continued, they would not have their semester and would lose their scholarships. The experience of past struggles shows us the opposite: in 1999, there was a nine-month strike to defend the free university. In the end, none of the threats highlighted today came true.
Management still has a powerful asset. In each faculty in struggle, there are weekly general assemblies. During these assemblies, in our department, we realized that some people were acting as if they were sent by the management to propose to end the strike.
They did so by explaining that the demands are right, but that the strike is ‘counterproductive’. These people began to play a divisive role in the assemblies, and not only in the Faculty of Science. In Mexico, they are called “dodgers”, people with two faces, who pretend to support the movement, but actually act in the interest of the leadership.
But their deceit began to gain influence. For example, the proposal to have on-line votes came from these people, and then, during the votes, we realized that they took the opportunity to vote several times! It was through this process that they were able to get their delegates elected for negotiations with management. They will negotiate the end of the strike, but we know in advance that with such “representatives”, we will not have the end of illegal practices, or less precariousness, or better wages.
There is also a university assembly bringing together all the departments: Economics, Humanities and Social Sciences, Medicine, etc. And here too, we see people who defend the management and who seek to silence us. There is a battle over who can vote at these assemblies. As the election of our representatives were fraudulent, we opposed the limitation of the right to vote to those representatives and called for every participant to be allowed to vote.
Negotiations are underway, but we are sure that we will gain nothing since our “representatives” have the same ideas as the management. That is why, with those who decided to continue the movement, we decided not to recognize their delegation. So, since last week, there are two assemblies that meet separately. We continue the strike, but in the other assembly they are negotiating the end of the strike. We are therefore in a somewhat critical situation.
What about the students?
From the beginning, we have been supported by students. Whenever there were votes on whether students supported the strike, more than 70% said ‘yes’. But we fear that those who have appointed themselves as delegates will weaken the movement. This is what has happened in other departments.
The management were able to send an official communiqué to announce the resumption of classes. In reaction, students decided to boycott the courses, or even to occupy the premises. But in some departments, this put an end to the movement, especially in less combative departments, such as that of Medicine.
What are your demands?
With our current teacher status, as asignatura, we are not allowed to work full-time. It is a part-time role. We are not allowed to work more than twelve hours a week, and we are paid 100 pesos per hour. We need to have two or three jobs at once to survive, either as a teacher in other schools or working in other fields.
For example, I work in another university and also on fixed-term research projects. We are in the most precarious situation, with a low salary that they pay not only late, but that they also pay only partially.
The authorities tell us that there is not enough money in the university’s coffers to increase salaries. But we know that this is not true. It is an autonomous university, but its funding is public. The amount paid to the university each year is sufficient, but there is a misuse of this money.
Management and administrative positions earn much more than us, and some even earn more than the President of the Mexican Republic! The director of UNAM, for example, is paid 200,000 pesos a month, and it is about the same for the directors of other departments.
Meanwhile, asignatura teachers earn only 1000 pesos a month. There is also the problem of corruption. Using a budget allocated for furniture for the director’s office, for example, he bought himself a sofa for 100,000 pesos. This is a way of embezzling money. Some pay for bodyguards for themselves with university money.
With this strike, we want things to start changing. At the very least, the law must be respected. But we are asking for more than that. The university is nothing without the professors. We account for 75% and we are treated in an undignified way. This is unacceptable at the best university in the country.
Interview on June 7
Please send messages of support, particularly from UCU and education union branches, to Viridiana at: viry_math@ciencias.unam.mx
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