PRESS RELEASE
LaRouche Says Build the PHLINO Now!
Nov. 19, 2007 (EIRNS)—This release was issued today by the Lyndon LaRouche Political Action Committee (LPAC).
Commenting on the ongoing flood disaster in the southern Mexican states of Tabasco and Chiapas, statesman Lyndon LaRouche underscored the urgency of building the Northwest Water Project (PHLINO) in Mexico, along with a series of other water projects, such as NAWAPA in Canada and the United States, to prevent a tragedy such as has occurred in southern Mexico, from occurring again.
"I've pushed these projects for years," LaRouche said, but "people didn't listen." Now, they have to be built. Were a decision made to do so, he said, including with support from the United States, it would help Mexico both by creating jobs, and easing pressure on illegal immigration into the U.S.
LaRouche's call coincides with new warnings from Tabasco Governor Andres Granier that the capital of Villahermosa is threatened with more catastrophic flooding. Granier explained that because the pump that is supposed to remove sewage and excess water from the city—which is below the level of the nearby Grijalva River—was damaged in the recent flooding, any more rain that would raise the Grijalva's water level, would mean that millions of liters of water would pour into the center of Villahermosa.
The state's medical infrastructure, meanwhile, is completely unable to deal with the current crisis. In a recent tour of medical facilities in Tabasco, Mexico's Health Secretary Jose Angel Cordova Villalobos reported that at least 25% of the state's health infrastructure was destroyed by the recent flooding, and this is probably a conservative estimate.
Floods destroyed X-ray and other crucial medical technology on the first floor of the Pemex Regional Hospital. In other clinics and health centers, medical equipment is still under water. Cordova estimated that at least 130 clinics or health centers were damaged in the flooding, and that both private and public clinics may not reopen until the Health Secretary verifies that they meet all health and sanitary standards.[crr]
After LaRouche Forum, PLHINO Gets Going
Sonora, Mexico's daily newspapers carried 8-column front-page headlines Nov. 14, that Mexico's Congress earmarked 30 million pesos for the large, TVA-like Pacific-Coast water management project known as PLHINO, in the National Water Committee's budget in 2008.
A member of the Chamber of Deputies' Water Resources Committee told the press that the approval was the result of commitments made at the Nov. 9 forum on Water, Energy, Food, and the PLHINO in Ciudad Obregon, Sonora—which LaRouche's supporters organized.
On Nov. 16, Sonora Governor Eduardo Bours yesterday continued the campaign for construction of the tri-state North West Water Project (the PLHINO), calling such infrastructure projects the key to increasing Mexico's ability to feed itself.
Speaking to agricultural producers in the south of the state, the governor warned the global raw materials crisis faced by Mexico will not be short, but this represents an opportunity, as well as a problem for Mexico, he said. We must reformulate our agriculture policy, and increase our food production capabilities, and infrastructure projects such as the PLHINO are the best way to do that. Mexico also needs a State policy of promoting more value-added agricultural production (i.e., more industrialization, less raw materials), because right now it is exporting everything cheaply—including its own people, said the governor.
On Nov. 9, at the Regional Forum on Water, Energy and Food organized by the 21st Century Pro-PLHINO Committee, Gov. Bours endorsed completion of the PLHINO—first proposed in 1960!—as the task which this generation must fulfill.
