MEXICAN UNEMPLOYED

Otago Daily Times, Issue 21267, 23 February 1931, Page 7

MEXICAN UNEMPLOYED

THREAT TO SACK , A CITY. ULTIMATUM TO AUTHORITIES. (United Press Association.) (By Electric Telegraph—Copyright.) NEW YORK, February 21. (Received Feb. 22, at 9 p.m.) A message from Mexico City states that news from Mexicali, Lower California, has been received to the effect that a mob of 3000 hungry unemployed peasants sent an ultimatum to the authorities threatening to sack _ the city tomorrow unless food and jobs are provided immediately. It is stated that there is considerable misery in the neighbourhood of Mexicali, where many people have recently died of starvation, and shops have experienced much trouble with mobs of peasants attempting to obtain food. The police hope to control the situation, and have been doing all that is possible to provide rations of flour and beans for the sufferers. The situation has been made worse by the recent reduction of the minimum salary in the cotton fields to about one dollar 20 cents a day. It is reported that the governor has left Mexicali for Tijuana after having issued orders that saloons and restaurants should discharge all foreign employees and substitute Mexican unemployed. An undercurrent of political difficulties heightens the situation, which is grave.