//CORRECTED UPDATE//EDUCATION-MEXICO: Losses Mount in 5-Month University Strike

By IPS Correspondents Reprint | | Print |

Pilar Franco

MEXICO CITY, Sep 21 1999 (IPS) - The strike at the largest university in Mexico and Latin America has reached the five-month point, with university officials reporting a 40 percent decline in scientific research and 100 million dollars in losses.

An assembly of strikers rejected a proposal by the National Autonomous University of Mexico’s (UNAM) highest body to schedule negotiations for the return of the university’s 300,000 students to the classrooms.

The General Council for the Strike (CGH), created April 20 when the UNAM’s longest student conflict erupted, demands that a university congress be held to discuss profound reforms for the school.

The UNAM Rectorship emphatically refuses to participate in such a congress, which would have decision-making powers.

Strike leaders say the university congress would promote the democratic transformation of the UNAM, and that the authorities’ acceptance of the congress is an indisputable condition for the strikers to end the conflict.

They claim they are defending a university that is public, free of charge, and autonomous, as well as its research and academic freedoms.

The strike originated in protests against reforms designed by university rector Francisco Barnés. The students interpreted his modernisation plans as harmful to the popular spirit that has traditionally governed at the UNAM.

A tuition hike in February also fanned the flames. The decision to raise fees from 0.02 dollars to 100 dollars was repealed June 7, but the concession was not enough to end the conflict.

Tuition expenses now have been reduced to “voluntary payments.”

The Mexican government’s subsidy to the UNAM this year reached more than 850 million dollars, while the university’s own income, from registration fees and other services, provided another 100 million.

Strike participants want the current academic term extended so students do not lose a semester. They also demand that authorities refrain from taking legal action against strike leaders.

Some 70,000 students have already lost a semester of study as a result of the strike, which also involves 24,400 administrative employees and 5,000 professors.

Meanwhile, 32 legal cases are pending against strike participants accused of vandalising university property during the conflict.

In the strike assembly that met over the weekend, the CGH decided against closing the university’s research institutes, which are responsible for 50 percent of the nation’s scientific output according to official data.

The strikers agreed that closing the institutes would create enemies among the researchers, and that doing so would appear to support the official position to unincorporate the research institutes in order to ultimately dismantle the UNAM.

But scientific research has already fallen by 40 percent, reported the UNAM general treasurer, José Manuel Covarrubias.

The strike’s impact on the development of research will be felt in the long term, stated Silvia Torres, director of the Astronomy Research Institute.

The strike has resulted in suspended projects and programmes, such as education via television, expositions, workshops and activities at the university museums.

“The strike affects us because we have had to cancel projects in addition to suspending classes, which affects the UNAM’s prestige outside the country,” explained researcher Julieta Fierro.

“As president of the International Astronomical Union, I represent an example of what we are able to do in developing countries. Now I participate in world forums at a disadvantage because my university is on strike,” Fierro indicated.

Though they were able to win free education and bring the UNAM’s administrative problems to the public light, the strike leaders “did not know how to handle the victory and ended up hurting those they were trying to defend,” said the researcher.

The University Council, the UNAMs maximum authority, is preparing for a special session Thursday to name a commission to “relate and negotiate” with the CHG.

Despite the lack of popular support for the strike, analysts say there is little chance for a quick solution to the conflict.

Some 20,000 strikers hold possession of the university campus, while discussions continue as to whether or not public authorities will intervene to remove them by force.