Guarantees of protections for workers, especially with respect to health and safety, were a much-heralded part of the NAFTA agreement, and won over many doubters. Now, as the program enters its sixth year, workers are making one last attempt to see if those provisions have any teeth. PNS associate editor David Bacon writes widely on immigrant and labor issues.

Plant managers called them the "jonkeados" -- the junked ones -- workers so sick they were given special jobs. But they weren't put on "light duty" until they could go back to the line. Instead, they were assigned tasks so unpleasant "that we knew they were just waiting for us to quit and leave," according to Joaquin Gonzalez.

In mid-December, Gonzales came here with fellow "jonkeados" to testify that the Mexican government had allowed their employer, Florida's Breed Technology, to systematically violate health and safety laws in two border plants - Auto Trim in Matamoros and Custom Trim in Valle Hermoso.

That San Antonio hearing may be the final test for NAFTA's labor side agreement, which the Clinton administration promised would protect workers' rights to decent factory conditions. Critics charge it has failed dismally.

Since NAFTA went into effect in January, 1994, more than 20 complaints have charged Mexico with failing to enforce laws guaranteeing workers' rights. There are some similar allegations against the United States.

All the cases have met a similar fate. Hearings are held. Workers testify. The U.S. Department of Labor's National Administrative Office (NAO), which hears complaints against Mexico, concludes that serious violations have occurred.

And then, nothing. No firm has ever been required to rehire illegally-fired workers or to enable an independent union to negotiate a contract. If this most recent hearing results in the same inaction, workers and unions on both sides of the border say they may abandon the process.

More than a dozen witnesses testified about health problems at the Breed maquiladoras. Many workers assume that medical complications suffered by their chilren are due to parents' exposures at work

Bruno Noe MantaŅez Lopez, who glued leather covers to steering wheels for five years at the Matamoros plant, told of a son born with spina bifida, a spinal tumor, an enlarged heart and no kneecaps. The doctor would not let him donate blood for his son. "He told me I couldn't give it since my blood was contaminated." After six months, his baby died.

Another worker's testimony described the birth of a daughter with no urethral opening. Despite heavy exposure to glue fumes while she was pregnant, the only protective equipment she says she received was an apron.

Mexican health and safety expert Dr. Francisco Mercado Calderon condemned Breed for causing irreversible injuries to workers, and declared that "gross negligence, or possibly wanton negligence by government authorities" had permitted the company's actions.

According to U.S. health expert Garrett Brown, Mexico's desperate need for hard currency to pay off International Monetary Fund loans has undermined its will to enforce the law, since it fears that will alienate foreign investors.

Breed Technologies, with $1.4 billion in sales in 1998, was represented at the hearing by a vice-president for legal affairs, but did not present evidence or respond to interview requests.

The AFL-CIO has supported the Breed workers. Deputy director for international affairs Tim Beaty agreed that the NAO is not very effective. "But," he said, "the process has provided a way for workers to show solidarity across borders, since NAFTA complaints are filed not in the country in which the violations occur, but by workers and unions in another one."

Martha Ojeda, director of the Coalition for Justice in the Maquiladoras, calls the Breed case a final test for NAFTA's labor side agreement. "If there's no remedy here," she says, "we'll have to look for some other alternative for protecting workers' rights on the border."

The political terrain is hostile, however. The party of Mexico's new president, Vicente Fox, has a long record of using low wages and weak government-affiliated unions as an incentive to attract investment to border states. It is unlikely he would launch an effort to protect the rights and health of maquiladora workers if it promised to discourage companies like Breed from building new plants.