Bankruptcy from Ahmsa, Tsunami that dragged families and companies

Jared Laureles

Sent

La Jornada newspaper
Sunday, February 9, 2025, p. 5

Monclova, Coah., Have passed just over two years since high furnaces of Mexico (AHMSA) produced the last gram of steel. Since then, 8 thousand workers were in unemployment, with truncated life projects and many of them are in misery. But the closing affectation not only remained there, it extended to families in the region, they broke hundreds of companies and the city dynamics were transformed.

In these hard years, workers and their families have had to face hunger, lack of work, stigmatization, repression and in literal helpless the extreme climatic conditions in this municipality considered once The capital of steel, Located in the center of Coahuila, about 700 kilometers from the Texas border.

Despite this, they remain in struggle. While they demand the payment of their backward salaries – more than 90 weeks – and settlements, 24 hours a day make guards in groups of three shifts in the accesses of the plant, to prevent scrap or thieves to continue dismantling the company’s wiring or damage the equipment that is of great valuewhich are their only hope to receive the resources that correspond to them after several years of work.

Some have died along the way and others committed suicide

In that battle at least 41 workers have died, Some have committed suicide, others ill. In their memory, wooden crosses hung on one of the metal fences of plant entrance 2.

This is one of the points that former workers monitor. There, The day He talked to them, outside the still majestic facilities of what was the largest acellist in the country and Latin America.

All this has been very hard; To solve we had to sell what belonged to us, the goods that cost us many years to get; Even so, we are still fighting to survivelaments Israel Gutiérrez, who at the time of work stoppage had 37 years of working in Ahmsa.

Since then he has lived all kinds of calamities: from getting food for his family until he cannot pay his 18 -year -old daughter’s studies. She wants to have a career, but there is no moneyexternal while with impotence squeezes his left fist and his voice breaks. His companions share that feeling and immediately sympathizes: Cheer up, race!while applauding to revive hope.

In one of the access of plant 2, steel miners improvised a rustic stove with a couple of bricks, a rack and a well with tizne, where they boil for coffee, which during the day they drink for endure hungersays Alejandro Ortiz, with 35 years in the company.

While pointing an old shelf where the residues of a kitchen oil, a piece of bread and a few tortillas wrapped in paper, man shows a small tool briefcase with about 30 coins of a weight: This is all dayproduct of bounted.

In this space there is a surveillance booth, which take advantage of to take care: a little shadow in the day or shelter of the cold at night while making their guard. There are also pieces of firewood and a ricked armchair, where they feel to talk, and when the anecdote fosters it, let out laughs.

Outside the place, on an dirt area, there is a small white color chapel and inside, next to religious images and candles, there are the photographs of workers that They died without receiving justice for looting of the acerera at the hands of its former owner, Alonso Ancira, a man who had support from the PRI governments.

Juan Valenzuela, who worked for 14 years in the hot rolling area, holds in his hands a wooden cross, that of Juan Manuel Arreguín, who – he says– He was the first partner to falland claim that while they have had to Live up to datethe “Barons White collar became rich. ”

Remember that at its peak, Ahmsa represented A lot of wealth For Monclova and the country.

In this company, a worker could win on average 20 thousand pesos per month, even more, when they worked extra time with double payments. In addition, they enjoyed 43 days of Aguinaldo, an assistance award of 8 thousand pesos and a savings fund that doubled the company, details Alfredo Reyna, a member of the Ahmsa Workers Defense Group.

In general, there was a considerable economic spill; They had the possibility to go on vacation, get cash loans and there was wool all year, but now there is nothing of that.

In the 1,500 hectares of Ahmsa floor 2 only the wind blows. The high furnaces, the peletizer and the force plant, among others, are now giant skeletons corroded due to lack of use.

The company was considered the economic engine of Monclova, where the two plants of the aceler that today look abandoned. Now it is only possible to see mountains of industrial waste and slag, which once was a symbol of intense steel activity.

In this city, with more than 250 thousand inhabitants and surrounded by high hills, it is possible Restaurants and hotels, where some former workers of La Acerera managed to get a job.

Another stamp is that of areas surrounding the industrial complex. When traveling through colonies such as Calderón, Mezquital, North Workers and South Workers, among others, marginality is palpated; There are scarce businesses and abandoned housing or in black work.

The bankruptcy hit hundreds of businesses that closed, from construction companies and mechanical workshops, to commercial premises that sold security equipment and tools to the steel, in addition to food stalls. At the close, in 2023, a total of 353 companies broke, according to IMSS data. But in addition, the entire supply chain was affected, particularly the bars of barroterán, Palau, Nueva Rosita and Hercules coal. There are 17 thousand direct and indirect workers affected by the closure of the company, although they could be about 50 thousand if the other firms that dragged are consideredJulián Torres Ávalos, president of the Ahmsa Workers Defense Group, points out.

The economic crisis of the Acerera was one of the greatest challenges faced by the then mayor Mario Dávila, who recognizes that the paralysis of that industry caused a drop up to 20 percent in the economy of the region.

To illustrate this affectation, he comments that Monclova stopped receiving 70 million pesos for property collection, in addition to having to erogate 25 million annually to maintain the residual treatments plant, since it was operated by the aceler in exchange for water treated was used for their cooling processes.

He affirms that in Monclova the recovery of employment was relatively dynamic, since the activities in this municipality were diversified, whose third part of its economy depended on Ahmsa.

Each family has stories linked to the giant acerero, which also marked generations. Grandparents, parents and children worked in this place. So important was the company that young people hoped to turn 18 to go to work in Ahmsasays Bernardo Quintero, a pensioner who for 25 years operated one of the high ovens at temperatures greater than 1,800 degrees.

After privatization, workers faced various moments of repression, both from state police and gang members Sent by the Democratic Union, created by Ancira.

To the above are added the threats of managers of the company, who threatened to say goodbye to those who had children working in the plant.

Fernando Valadez is a muscular man; He was 20 years of work in Ahmsa and grieves for not being able to take home The most basic. He shares that his companions have had to sell any good to survive; Personally, he says, he has done masonry work, plumbing, disassembling cars in shooters or cleaning courtyards to carry out his family. Actually, it gives sadness and depression not bringing food home or being able to solve the expenses of the boys who want to studyhe expresses.

The lack of economic solvency also caused family disintegration, as many couples divorced, there were children who took Other roads And not a few mothers were orillated – he assures – prostitution; It was incalculable damagereproaches Quintero.

The former workers say that from any of the state governments headed by the PRI they have received support; They have requested educational scholarships, jobs and pantries, but they still have no response. We require solutionsclaims Agustín Villanueva, a pensioner who worked 35 years at the plant.

They appeal to Sheinbaum to avoid More looting

It is necessary that President Claudia Sheinbaum finds out about the real situation: they ask her to intervene to meet her demands, because they fear that in the appraisal of goods there is more looting.

The men who manufactured the sheets for railway cars and steel to build some of the main skyscraper in Paseo de la Reforma are now in difficult conditions, to such an extent that some had to migrate to cities such as Monterrey or even to the United States. Others had to get their children out of school and put them to work for support with house expenses.

In the end, for a bad decision, corruption and bad management of businessman Ancira, they were simply discarded.