Thread: A Mile-high Conversation With Vicente Fox

A Mile-high Conversation With Vicente Fox
With less than three months left in office, Mexican President Vicente Fox offers some candid opinions about his disgust for politics, migration and "NAFTA's missing chapter."
Editor's note: Last week David Taylor, the CBC's Parliamentary Bureau Chief, spoke with Mexican President Vicente Fox on board a flight from the capital of Chiapas, Tuxtla Gutiérrez, to Mexico City for CBC Radio's The

House: The Week in National Politics. The following is an edited transcript of that interview.

DAVID TAYLOR: President Vicente Fox used this trip [to Chiapas] to open two new hospitals and a detention centre for undocumented immigrants. This is a reflective time for President Fox. He leaves office in December, but his legacy is secure as the first opposition party leader in seven decades to occupy the president's office. I spoke with him in the air en route from Chiapas to Mexico City. President Fox, welcome back to The House.

VICENTE FOX: Very pleased, and thank you very much for the opportunity, and thank you for visiting Chiapas with us today.

TAYLOR: The day that you were elected president in 2000, the crowd in downtown Mexico City shouted out to you, "Don't let us down!" and you told them you wouldn't. You're just a number of months from the end of your term as president. I'm wondering how you feel today looking back on that moment and how you fulfilled the wishes of the people who voted for you then.

FOX: It's been a long way, but it's been fruitful. We have been able to transit from an authoritarian government, from a one single party system, to a real consolidated democracy. Today in Mexico we enjoy freedom as we never did before. The economy is very strong, growing, and creating a lot of jobs. And right now on the border there is a maquiladora system that accounts for 1,500,000 jobs. They have a deficit of 100,000 jobs that they are looking to fulfil today.

TAYLOR: You came into office talking a great deal about what you called "the whole enchilada" on the immigration file with the United States in particular, and interestingly, here you are at the end, and immigration is very much a front-of-mind issue both in the United States and in Mexico. U.S. lawmakers didn't seem to buy into your initial solution for things. What do you think of the direction of U.S. policy on this file right now?

FOX: Well, migration has been the top-priority issue in the relationship between Mexico and United States. And we've been working hard these five years. I've been doing so with President Bush and his team. Today we are very close to reaching a formal agreement on how to manage migration as an opportunity, and not as a problem. Those who are working undocumented in the United States but do have a job should now become legal citizens, and this doesn't mean that they will become U.S. citizens. It's not an amnesty. The future flow of migrants enhances the U.S. economy. So they enrich the U.S. economy and they enrich their families in Mexico. We are very proud of them.

TAYLOR: What do you say to critics on this issue who suggest that both countries benefit from the status quo, for instance that Mexico uses emigration, people leaving the country, as a safety valve when unemployment or the rate of job creation isn't high enough to keep them here?

FOX: Well let me... let me tell them that the U.S. economy is not going to be able to keep competitive in front of China and Asia if it's not by joining forces on this partnership that we have between Canada, United States, and Mexico through NAFTA.

TAYLOR: You had a great deal of hope for NAFTA when you came into power, and I'll just quote some of the critics. You mention the maquiladora zone. They argue often that these are jobs are of lower quality. Has NAFTA delivered on what you have expected for Mexico?

FOX: Absolutely yes. [Today] a worker at a maquiladora is very different from the perception that there was in the past. Today those workers earn $4 an hour plus fringe benefits. They have the highest salaries throughout Mexico. And the gap between their income and the income of a worker on the U.S. side in Texas has narrowed. So it's been very successful, NAFTA, in creating jobs and in improving the income of those jobs. This maquiladora system and NAFTA have given Mexico the opportunity to advance to a very competitive economy. The fact that the surplus that we have in our trading with United States is worth [$65 billion US], which is more than any other country in Latin America does for export. So we're very pleased with NAFTA, but we're not satisfied.

TAYLOR: Canada and Mexico have both had some frustrations in dealing with the United States on trade matters. Our headline item is softwood lumber; sugar has been an issue for your country. Why is it that Canada and Mexico don't seem to be able to act on common ground that would seem to exist between our two countries on trade matters?

FOX: Okay, because one missing chapter of NAFTA is the arbitration institution, it's making sure that we have the capacity to solve institutionally and through a solid legal arbitration the differences that frequently present themselves. We have problems with the United States in concrete, cement and tuna fish. But I think it would be much better to have an institution that would give us the opportunity to solve problems without having conflicts among ourselves.

TAYLOR: I must confess I've enjoyed watching Mexican politics over the years. And you cannot wait for your life outside of politics, and I'm wondering why.

FOX: I was never born to be a politician. I love farming; I love more being with my grandson; I love being with my wife. I'm up to here with politics. I have to say there are a lot of hipocritas --hypocrites -- too many traitors, very strong lack of ethics and morality, many lies, a lot of corruption. That's not my world. I serve Mexico and Mexicans. I did it with clean hands, with honesty. I will have that as the best memory of what I have done in my life. But life goes on, and I will keep enjoying life.

TAYLOR: President Fox, your plane is descending into Mexico City now, so I guess we'll stop it here, but thank you very much for your time.

FOX: Good, because I need tequila, because I still have two meetings more and I still have dinner with a union. So I will have my tequila now so that I recuperate my strength.

TAYLOR: Thank you very much.

FOX: Have a tequila yourself.

Published with permission from the CBC's The House: The Week in National Politics.

editor@embassymag.ca

http://www.embassymag.ca/html/index.php ... ril/5/fox/

President Vicente Fox used this trip [to Chiapas] to open two new hospitals and a detention centre for undocumented immigrants

. . . . Today those workers earn $4 an hour plus fringe benefits. They have the highest salaries throughout Mexico. And the gap between their income and the income of a worker on the U.S. side in Texas has narrowed. So it's been very successful, NAFTA, in creating jobs and in improving the income of those jobs. This maquiladora system and NAFTA have given Mexico the opportunity to advance to a very competitive economy. The fact that the surplus that we have in our trading with United States is worth [$65 billion US], which is more than any other country in Latin America does for export.

a detention center for "undocumented immigrants" -- where are the protests?


According to Fox, the Mexican economy has benefited from the United States, why can't these people make a living in their own country? The United States has a deficit and Mexico has a surplus because of NAFTA, but he wants to export all his countrymen . . . sounds like Mexico is doing an ethic cleansing of the 'lower class' where they only have the elites left.

FOX: Absolutely yes. [Today] a worker at a maquiladora is very different from the perception that there was in the past. Today those workers earn $4 an hour plus fringe benefits. They have the highest salaries throughout Mexico. And the gap between their income and the income of a worker on the U.S. side in Texas has narrowed.

In other words, wages in Texas have dropped. $4/hr? Yeah, that's been REAL GOOD for MEXICO!

So it's been very successful, NAFTA, in creating jobs and in improving the income of those jobs.

Again, for MEXICO!

This maquiladora system and NAFTA have given Mexico the opportunity to advance to a very competitive economy. The fact that the surplus that we have in our trading with United States is worth [$65 billion US], which is more than any other country in Latin America does for export. So we're very pleased with NAFTA, but we're not satisfied.

Of course not, you Globalist Pig! You won't be satisfied until we're ALL living in POVERTY!



I had to stop, it feels like my head is going to EXPLODE!