In Mexico, on June 18, on the occasion of Father’s Day, groups of mothers posted in public squares the photos and names “bad food payers”, those millions of fathers who do not pay child support. For the third edition of this mobilization, the portraits of these men were hung on long wires with clothespins, in symbolic places, such as courthouses, central squares or in front of the presidential palace, in Mexico City.
Each poster of “debtor” indicates in addition to his name, the amount of the debt and a short summary of the dispute: such a business manager who declared himself insolvent while his business is flourishing, such a father who has gone abroad “forgetting” her three children in Mexico…
“Social shame is more effective than justice”, says with a smile Diana Luz, spokesperson for the National Front of Mothers against Bad Payers, a collective born in 2021 and now present in thirty of the country’s thirty-two states.
In Mexico, the situation of abandonment of single mothers has always existed in all social classes: in seven out of ten cases of divorce, the fathers do not pay the maintenance due. This represents nearly thirty-five million mothers, or 67.5% of single mothers in Mexico, according to data from the National Institute of Statistics and Geography.
“Immigration restriction measures”
This year, Diana Luz, 36, has a broad smile, because a major battle has been won: the mothers obtained, at the end of April, the establishment of a national register of maintenance obligations, kept by the Institution of child welfare, one of their main demands. The father who does not assume his obligations will no longer be able to renew his passport or his driver’s license, will not have the right to buy or sell property. And, if he remarries, his situation as a bad payer will be made public on the day of the ceremony.
To claim a position in the judiciary or to be elected, men will now have to present a certificate of “non-registration” on this register.. “In addition, migratory restriction measures are planned, to prevent those who are registered there from leaving the country”, said Senator Olga Sánchez, a former judge at the Supreme Court and who carried this project for the Morena party (left, in power).
“The important thing was to have a public register, because now, with a single name, you can know whether or not the person is a bad payer”, rejoices Diana Luz. So far, some twenty-two states of the Mexican Republic have boasted of having set up such registers, including that of Mexico City since 2011. “In fact, only eight registers really worked, and you had to have the tax number of the person to find it, relativizes Diana Luz. However, their ex-girlfriends do not always have them. On the other hand, these registers did not give rise to any real sanction. »
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