Canacar, Mexico’s national trucking association, launched the first in a series of protests against foreign investment in Mexico's trucking industry yesterday morning, specifically focusing on Transportes EASO, a subsidiary of Memphis, Tenn.-based M.S. Carriers.

According to the Journal of Commerce, Canacar says the company is violating the North American Free Trade Agreement, which reserves domestic point-to-point hauling to Mexican companies.
The article said Canacar has stopped short of blocking major highways, which would be a federal crime, but allowed 500 truckers to demonstrate around highways in the Queretero, Puebla, Guadalajara, Saltillo, Monterrey, Manzanillo, Matamoros, Mazatlan and Ciudad Mante areas.
The truckers parked their rigs on highway shoulders with banners, periodically driving in groups at 15 mph. The protest continued until late morning.
"Until now the authorities have not responded to our demands," a Canacar spokesman told the JoC. "If this continues, we will escalate protests in the next few days."
According to the Indianapolis Star, Canacar is accusing M.S. Carriers and other trucking companies of conniving with Mexican companies to make domestic shipments within Mexico -- a violation of NAFTA.
Mike Starnes, chairman of Memphis-based M.S Carriers. told the JoC that he didn’t know why Canacar was singling out his company.
"This is totally a political issue," he said. "We've been audited by the government a couple of times, and our operations are totally legal, totally run by Mexicans."
However, Canacar is seeking the cancellation of EASO's operating permit as its primary demand.
Canacar also targeted Transportacion Maritima Mexicana and Femsa Logistica for violating NAFTA. Both companies have foreign investors. And according to the Star, Canacar is also focusing efforts on Celadon, an Indianapolis-based trucking company.
Celadon CEO Stephen Russell told the paper that none of the accusations were true. He said that the company does own an interest in Servicios de Transportacion Jaguar, which operates about 200 trucks, a fraction of Celadon's fleet of 2,300 tractors and 6,500 trailers.
But all of Jaguar's operations are international, running from Mexican cities to the U.S. border, or south to Central America, Russell says. "Celadon is in compliance," he insists.