During the presidential campaign President #Donald Trump repeatedly attacked illegal Mexican immigrants and promised to build a #border wall between the two countries, but recent news shows that there are reasons why people risk entering the United States illegally.
Explosions
On Saturday night Reuters and other agencies reported that three people died in Tultepec outside Mexico City when a house where fireworks were being manufactured exploded. This was the same town where more than three dozen people died in a massive explosion at a fireworks market last December.
Incidents such as these highlight the dangerous working conditions for the poor in the country which force many to seek work in the United States where at least the safety of their new if illegal places of employment is ensured.
To these work factors must also be added the various levels of corruption in the country that make life difficult for those without the means to pay for services, or to gain access to markets for their goods, etc.
Naturally there are also other circumstances that force people to flee their places of birth
Drug wars
In January famous Mexican drug lord Joaquin “El Chapo” Guzman was extradited to the United States to face trial on drug related and other charges. His departure from the scene did not have the desired effect in Mexico; rather than pacify the situation, the violence became even worse.
The departure of the head of the Sinaloa drug cartel, the world’s most powerful such organization has led to an open turf war which has added even more live to that country’s horrifying list of drug related deaths.
As reported by USA Today, a war has broken out amongst Guzman’s former lieutenants for control of the organization and as usual in these cases the kidnappings and deaths are the order of the day.
Since former President Felipe Calderon announced a crackdown in 2007 the drug cartels and gangs over more than 100,000 have died, of which almost 21,000 only in 2016. In January alone Sinalao, Guzman’s former capital, accounted for 2,152 depths in the war amongst his former lieutenants.
Other solution
These statistics of work and drug related deaths make it easy to understand why people want to move to the United States and why the wall will not be an effective barrier for those who flee probable death if they remain at home.
People leave to find a better life and do not uproot their families to a country where their legal status is precarious on a simple whim.
The solution to the problem of illegal immigration is not in a physical barrier but in resolving the matter of work conditions, the corruption, the drug activities and the other internal situations which force people to move to other countries.
If President Trump is serious about finding a permanent solution to the Mexican immigration issue a much more effective and definitely much cheaper alternative would not be to build a wall which in the long run will not work.
The easiest and most effective solution would be to meet Mexico’s President Enrique Peña Nieto to work out a plan of cooperation to eliminate the need for people to leave Mexico in search of work. Does the Oval Office have the political determination and foresight to look for such a solution?
