June 8, 1999

University Officials Yield to Student Strike in Mexico

By JULIA PRESTON

EXICO CITY -- After seven weeks of a grueling student strike at the National Autonomous University of Mexico, the largest institution of higher education in Latin America, the administration on Monday backed down before the students' protests, opening the way for a settlement.

The strike, the longest in the university's 89-year history, halted the studies of 270,000 students. The strikers shut down classes on April 20 to protest an attempt by the president, Francisco Barnes de Castro, to make students who could afford it pay tuition.

On Monday, the governing council of the university, a 132-member body that includes both faculty and students, approved a proposal offered by a weary Barnes to establish new tuition fees but make them voluntary.

After weeks of stalemate when the two sides were not even talking, Barnes was forced to yield to the strikers' determination to preserve the principle of free public education at the university, which is known by its Spanish initials as the UNAM.

The strike grew more intractable as it dragged on and turned into a battle for the soul of the university. The strikers want it to remain a place for the masses, where all kinds of young Mexicans can get at least a little bit of college education. The administration, much of the faculty and some students hoped to make it more selective and shift the curriculum toward practical preparation for the increasingly tight and specialized job market in Mexico.

In February, the governing council had voted a tuition code proposed by Barnes that called for students with some economic means to pay about $150 a year. Needy students would not have to pay.

Since the university's tuition scales have not been readjusted for inflation and currency fluctuations since 1948, the current fee is equivalent to about 2 American pennies a year.

The federal government now pays 90 percent of the $1 billion annual budget. Barnes said that the new tuition fees could raise $84 million, or about 8 percent of that figure.

The university, whose vast campus is a teeming city within Mexico City, is seminal to Mexican life. Several recent presidents either studied or taught there. Leading intellectuals consider it a nationalist duty to serve on its faculty. The UNAM was the birthplace of the student movement of 1968, which turned into a nationwide rebellion against autocratic rule and started Mexico on a three-decade odyssey toward democracy.

Barnes wanted the extra funds to stop a steep decline in the UNAM's academic performance. Once a flagship in Hispanic America, it now struggles with poorly paid teachers, dwindling funds for research, huge numbers of absent or failing students and outmoded facilities.

The students' strike divided public opinion. The dispute was polarized in the first week when a student, Martha Alejandra Trigueros Cruz, was run over and killed by a bus during a street protest.

The strikers drew big crowds to marches in the capital and gathered enough support to shut down all activities on campus except basic research although thousands of students quietly continued their courses in makeshift off-campus classrooms.

At the outset Barnes had sworn that he would not give in to "the abuse" of the strike "no matter what pressures or threats we face."

On Monday he conceded that he had run into a political wall. Barnes is the third UNAM president since 1987 to go down in defeat in attempting to charge fees and tighten standards at the UNAM.

"Whether or not to pay tuition will be a matter for each student's conscience," Barnes said, "and not an obligation imposed by someone else's decision."

Some strikers were belligerent. They brawled with students who attended off-campus classes and violently closed down some of the classrooms. The administration took out seven arrest warrants against strikers accused of stealing computers, earthquake monitoring equipment and university vehicles.

Student leaders said they had to strike to keep the university open to rich and poor Mexicans and preserve its liberal arts design. They accused Barnes of trying to transform it into a white-collar vocational school by scaling back disciplines like philosophy and political science in favor of nuts-and-bolts courses in computers, economics, accounting and science.

"We don't want a university that just serves private companies," said Mauricio Cruz, 18, a striking student at one of the preparatory high schools that are part of the UNAM system. "We want it to be at the service of society."

The strikers also resisted the administration's drive to impose tougher examinations, time limits and other requirements for graduation. Many Mexicans lost patience with that part of the students' demands. Echoing the society, the press turned against the strikers, and they came across in the media as an intransigent minority among students who by and large were willing to pay tuition and study more.

"People in general are opposed to this strike," said Carlos Ornelas, a professor of education at another public university in Mexico City. "Mexicans no longer automatically swallow what the government says, but they also don't accept anti-government positions either."

The governing council also said on Monday that it will approve an amnesty for strikers who committed minor police infractions and will extend the semester into the summer so the students can make up the lost time.