By RICARDO CASTILLO

Two Women’s Days

It’s not amazing, given the nature of the brutality of some Mexican machos, to be witnessing the enormous support the two days of protest by Mexican women is getting just about from everywhere.

You name it, social groups, universities, government secretariats (like Education, no classes on Monday, March 9) and entrepreneurial groups have all joined the pack.

Actually, though International Women’s Day was intended for marching in protest against all violence against women, including murder or femicide, it was not until about a month ago that a group of three women in the state of Veracruz who call themselves the Witches of the Sea launched a summons to include a second day of protests on March 9, called #a day without women or #a day without us, in which all women who want to willfully join the full protest stay home and do nothing.

A third slogan in Spanish – and in verse – also came out claiming #el nueve nadie se mueve, nobody moves on March 9.

But besides violence, Mexican women seek claims for their exclusion in the economic life of the nation – such as lots of work for little or no pay- as it is considered that women represent 52 percent of the population. We’ll see what the results of the ongoing census say, but it’s not far-fetched to consider women a majority.

Definitely, as social news hounds, at Pulse News Mexico, we’re observingly watching how the proceedings go.

Peso on the Skids

Only three weeks ago, the Mexican peso was trading at approximately 18.60 per dollar.

Then all of the sudden, it began to climb in pric,e and on Sunday, March 8, it was at 19.9018 per green smacker. That’s an approximate 8 percent loss in devaluation terms. On Friday, March 6, it closed at 20.11.

The reasons for this particular devaluation are elusive. The first thing that comes to mind is the financial world’s panic over the coronavirus epidemic, but seemingly, that’s not the case, because the peso gained strength in the first days of the scare.

Others claim that the peso is volatile due to the carry trade going on with international investors, but again, this was not happening previously since the peso had not devalued at this rate since the rise of Donald Trump back in 2016.

How much more will the peso dip? Maybe not much, because as you can see from the trade values considered, it went down from 20.11 to 19.90.

But by Sunday night, the peso had gone back down to 21.34 to the dollar.

With the peso, one can never be certain of what will come.

Oil Prices Also Drop

The coronavirus panic also triggered yet another drop in international oil prices, so much so that the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) already made the decision to cut production by 1.5 million barrels a day for the second quarter of 2020.

Analysts believe that markets are overstocked given the drop in international demand.

In the latest price drop, Brent lost $1.14 a barrel,down to $49.99, while West Texas Intermediate dropped to $45.90.

The lower-grade Mexican mix is selling at $40.32 per barrel, an extremely low price that is way below the income calculated by the Chamber of Deputies to meet this year’s budget demands.

The Spy Is the Sky

Mexican Senate President Senator Mónica Fernández Balboa demanded the presence of police officers from the Fiscal General of the Republic on Thursday, March 5, to investigate a case of espionage of the National Action Party (PAN.)

“I have just been informed by administrative personnel that we (PAN senators) were being spied on and they just delivered the microphones to me,” said Senator Mauricio Kuri.

“I thought that this was something that had happened years ago and that in Mexico these practices were from a bygone era.”

The accusation was taken as a joke by National Regeneration majority senators.

In fact, one of them, Jesusa Rodríguez, recalled that also last week an Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI) senator (Carlos Jiménez) packed four quarter-kilo bags with apparent grass to show the size of one kilo of marijuana – while the marijuana bill was being debated.

Someone asked him if it was the real stuff and he answered. “no, it’s oregano.”

Senator Rodriguez answered the accusation of espionage with a tweet: “To spy is an immoral act, but, who would even care to spy on the PAN? It must be even more boring than smoking oregano.” Of course, Jesusa likes grass.

First Daylight Savings Time Change

On Sunday, at 2 a.m., the first summer daylight savings time change took place in Mexico, but only along the border with the United States, covering a total of 33 municipalities.

In the rest of the nation, the daylight savings summer schedule will begin on April 5 and end on Oct. 25.

Only the states of Quintana Roo and Sonora are excluded from the changes.

Sports: León Challenged

Surprise. Everything seemed to point to the fact that León, in the state of Guanajuato, would be the venue of the 2026 Central American and Caribbean Games, but suddenly the Dominican Republic threw its hat into the ring and also wants to be the venue of the games.

Of particular importance in the celebration is that the Central American and Caribbean Games Organization was founded in 1926 and commemorates its first anniversary.

The Dominican Republic has already held the games twice, in 1974 and 1986, but Mexican Olympic officials are going to compete hard on the grounds that León has the infrastructure for the game, and is ready to build whatever is missing in case of getting the designation.

The Mexican Olympic Organization is also stressing the timing and formality of the application and the fact that that Mexico would like to hold the games again in its first 100 years.