Union members, left-wing activists and farmers by the thousand marched to the capital's central plaza Thursday in a major display of opposition to the president's plans to raise taxes on food and medicine and sell state-owned assets.

The crowd estimated by police at 80,000 packed major avenues from Mexico's independence monument to the city center. The march had been billed as Mexico's largest in years, but the turnout fell short of the 150,000 predicted by organizers.

The march was largely peaceful, with demonstrators chanting "Our country is not for sale!" Still, authorities dispatched thousands of police to guard against possible violence, arresting at least four people in the afternoon along Reforma Avenue, the capital's main drag.

The protest reflected growing frustration with Mexican President Vicente Fox and proposals that have led to increasing political paralysis and a sharp drop in the peso against the dollar.

"The only solution will be a national strike, to stop them from selling what little we Mexicans have left to the foreigners," said Rosalia Prado, a middle school teacher dressed in the yellow colors of the leftist Democratic Revolution Party.

Speaking Thursday about the marches from Michoacan state, Fox said "we should all enjoy Mexico's unprecedented new climate of liberty ... freedom of expression and the right to protest are never going to be blocked by my administration."

Fox recently commented that the country "is doing wonderfully" — a statement that sharply contrasted with the current economy, and led one local newspaper to run an ironic headline, "Another Day Here In Wonderland."

Protesters, who converged in three columns to the city's central plaza, are mostly opposed to the president's proposal to eliminate a sales tax exemption on food and medicine and to allow more private investment in the state-run electricity sector to ease projected power shortages.

Ramiro Gomez, a rancher from Chihuahua, showed up riding a chestnut-colored horse to protest the government's free-market policies.

"We have an abandoned countryside," Gomez said. "Nobody is making money, now production is paralyzed and many of the producers have emigrated. We want national sovereignty in food, and to consume only Mexican corn, beans, wheat and meat."

Marchers included movie production workers whose jobs are threatened by Fox's proposal to sell off a state-owned movie studio.

"We risk becoming a subsidiary of Hollywood, and losing our identity as Mexicans," said German Ramirez, a set builder at a state-owned movie studio who would lose his job under Fox's proposals.

Juan Molinar, a congressional leader from Fox's conservative National Action Party, defended the sales tax increases, calling the exemptions for food and medicine "a huge subsidy for purchases by the wealthy, with money that could be spent helping the poor."

Molinar said National Action is willing to compromise on the tax changes, but Fox has had little success at lobbying lawmakers.

Fox's troubles have taken a toll on one major political supporter, congressional leader Elba Esther Gordillo. She is fighting off an attempt by disgruntled members of her Institutional Revolutionary Party, or PRI, to oust her from her leadership post for being too close to Fox.

"The worst thing is that Fox has lost control," said Rosendo Flores, an electrical workers' union leader and organizer of the march. "He's isolated, and even so he insists on imposing totally erratic policies."

The struggle over the reforms, which featured Gordillo in a public row with fellow PRI leader Roberto Madrazo, has unsettled financial markets, sending the peso to a record low of 11.355 against the U.S. dollar on Wednesday.

"As long as there is no clear outlook on what is going to happen with reforms, volatility will continue," Mexico's central bank governor, Guillermo Ortiz, said Wednesday.

Close

Today's Top News		Top International News
+Taiwan OKs watered-down referendum bill ( 2003-11-27) +US duties on Chinese imports criticized ( 2003-11-27) +Beijing in the dark about US case on spy ( 2003-11-28) +Chinese sue Japan, firm over slave labour ( 2003-11-28) +Trial opens for nation's biggest `ice' case ( 2003-11-27)		+Thousands protest Mexican President Fox ( 2003-11-28) +Top Shiite cleric demands immediate polls in major blow to US Iraq plans ( 2003-11-28) +'Master' and 'slave' computer labels unacceptable ( 2003-11-28) +Russia prosecutors say seized more YUKOS papers ( 2003-11-28) +Violence leaves 12 dead in Indian Kashmir ( 2003-11-28)