FROM EIR DAILY ALERT
López Obrador Takes Fight Against Oil Theft to the Mexican People
Jan. 23, 2019 (EIRNS)—As he promised, Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador, or AMLO, has taken his fight against illegal oil theft directly to the population, yesterday arriving on the first leg of an organizing tour, at the towns of Acambay and Ixtlahuaca in the state of Mexico, two areas in which oil theft has been significant.
In both locations, López Obrador told citizens they would no longer have to resort to stealing gasoline, as they have been forced to do up to now, because now the government would be assisting both older adults and young people, to ensure “that there are jobs for all,” or pensions for retirees and the disabled. There will no longer be excuses for the oil theft, he said.
“Anyone who, out of necessity, has resorted to ‘huachicoleo’ [a Spanish term used to refer to the fuel theft], now is guaranteed the right to a job, and to an income necessary to survive,”
he vowed.
There are a large number of Pemex oil pipelines in and around both Ixtlahuaca and Acambay, and the government’s policy of deploying the military to protect them was evident yesterday, as police and National Guard were stationed at all access roads and highways leading to the nearby Tula-Toluca pipeline. However, no one was denied access to the President. López Obrador asked the townspeople what they thought of the government’s plan, and if they would commit themselves not to steal fuel. “Will you continue supporting us, and help in guiding people so they don’t resort to huachicoleo?” he asked. He got a unanimous “Si,” in response.
In today’s press conference, López Obrador reported that gasoline and fuel shortages in northern Mexico—Monterrey and Reynosa in particular—were the result of attacks on Pemex pipelines in that region.
