Oaxaca, Mexico: ADO buys off APPO -- unsuccessfully

ADO is the luxury bus line that connects Oaxaca with most every city in the country. From the DF to Huatulco to Cancún, ADO goes just about everywhere. They've got good equipment and do a fairly decent job, for Mexico, of running on time and according to pre-determined schedules. And they mean to keep it that way.


ADO buses at the Oaxaca station this afternoon.

One of Mark in Mexico's sources had a chat with an ADO driver a few days ago. The driver told her that ADO was protecting its buses from APPO by buying off the criminals. ADO has given prepaid bus passes to APPO leadership to distribute to its out-of-state rank and file to use for free transport to get to Oaxaca and firebomb Oaxacan's property.

All a pass holder has to do is show up at the ticket counter with the pass and a paying customer is denied a seat if the bus is full. If the bus is not full, the pass holder bypasses the ticket counter completely, goes directly to the bus, presents the pass to the driver and the driver has to assign the APPO thug an empty seat. In this way, ADO has bought protection for its vehicles.

Well, not quite all of them.


Saturday night. Forgot to post the NO FUMAR signs.

Note: The photo taken this afternoon was not taken without some difficulty. When I stopped to snap it, an ADO security guard was quick to tell me, "No puede tomar fotos." I asked, "Mande?" (huh?). He repeated his stern admonition. I looked down to note that I was standing on the sidewalk which is city property and not ADO property. However, there were some faint yellow warning stripes painted on the sidewalk which I surmised meant that ADO had filed a claim to this small piece of formerly publicly owned real estate. So, I responded, "Ok," stepped backwards 3 feet into the street and proceeded to exercise my basic human right to photograph any damned buses I wished. He didn't say anything -- out loud, anyway.

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TAGS: Oaxaca, Mexico, Oaxaca teachers strike, APPO, ADO