----- Original Message -----
Sent: Wednesday, December 08, 2004 11:41
AM
Subject: FW: [es-solidarity] MPR-12 press
release
------ Forwarded Message
From:
Ciudades Hermanas <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Date:
Wed, 08 Dec 2004 09:59:32 -0600
To: [EMAIL PROTECTED],
List Serve <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject:
[es-solidarity] MPR-12 press release
*Answers to frequently asked questions about es-solidarity are
at the bottom of this message.*
[EMAIL PROTECTED],
the following (attached
as well) is the statement given at a press conference held this morning in San
Salvador in the context of the upcoming CAFTA vote in the legislative
assembly.
The Popular Resistance Movement October 12th (MPR-12) and its
member organizations are planning activities against the ratification of the
agreement.
In solidarity,
Jesse Kates-Chinoy
U.S. El Salvador Sister
Cities
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POSITION AGAINST THE INTENTIONS OF THE
GOVERNMENT TO FORCE THE LEGISLATIVE ASSEMBLY TO RATIFY THE FREE TRADE
AGREEMENT WITH THE U.S.
Last week, various cabinet members of
the government submitted the free trade agreement with the United States
(CAFTA) to the Legislative Assembly for them to ratify and make into a law.
CAFTA is being promoted by the government under the false notion that it
will solve the problems of our nation. However, there are many real
reasons for our people to reject it. Some of them are the
following:
1. CAFTA will
provoke mass importation of products from the United Status, which Hill deepen
our trade deficit (the difference between our exports and our imports,) and
raise even higher our external debt. We must take into account that
without this free trade agreement with the powerful North American economy,
our trade deficit augmented 1.2 billion dollars during the administration of
President Francisco Flores. Moreover, the deficit with Chile, with whom we
have a free trade agreement since May of 2002 grew from 14 to 44 million
dollars. Our trade deficit with Mexico augmented from 244 to 278
million dollars from 2000 to 2003.
2.
CAFTA will affect our small agricultural
production by permitting the rich and subsidized farm industry from the United
States to send its overproduction to our country without paying taxes
(tariffs.) This damage will ruin thousands of producers of basic grains,
vegetables, cattle, pig and chicken farmers, as well as thousands of people
who work in the agro industry of dairy products.
3.
This damage to the small agricultural sector
will make our country even more dependent on the United States to obtain the
food that our population needs. A good quantity of essential provisions
will come from the exterior, as long as there are dollars to buy them, if this
currency begins to grow scarce due to the growing commercial deficit, there
will be scarcity of food as well and more hunger.
4.
The deterioration of the agricultural sector
will augment the emigration to the urban centers and other countries, which
will be translated into greater pressure on the urban municipalities, more
environmental contamination, and more family disintegration.
5.
CAFTA Hill provoke a re-concentration of
agricultural lands, as people abandon the countryside they will sell their
plots to big businesses that produce fruits to be frozen and sold in the
United States.
6. CAFTA as well will ruin
many small and medium-sized businesses that sell in the domestic market,
producers of furniture, shoes, printed materials and clothing.
7.
CAFTA will debilitate the State, which will not
be able to decide how to invest many of its resources as the large North
American companies will win the majority of bids away from the governmental
institutions (ministries, municipalities and public companies), for sales and
investments. Moreover, by taking away tariffs the government will lower
its income and deepen its financial crisis. In the short term it would
have to raise taxes or fire personnel from public offices.
8.
CAFTA will have very negative impacts for the
female population, who will go to work in the textile factories, where the
working conditions are horrible, or will look for low quality jobs in
commercial businesses and the service sector. As well, when their
spouses emigrate away, many of them will have to take on alone the
responsibilities of the family unit.
9.
CAFTA will harm the majority of the population:
producers in the rural areas, the small agricultural cooperatives, the working
population who will suffer the race to the bottom for wages and workers
rights, the small and medium-sized industries, the people who will lose their
jobs and the consumer population, who will pay more taxes and buy at higher
prices the medicines protected by U.S. patents.
10. For all of
the above, we call upon the population to reject this agreement which will
only benefit the big businesses of the United States and a small group of
millionaires from our country, linked to the imports business, the banking
sector, the textile factories and the exportation of sugar and
fruits.
December 8, 2004
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The U.S.-El Salvador Sister Cities
Homepage is: http://www.us-elsalvador-sisters.org
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