Narco News 2001
Day
Two of Historic EZLN Caravan
Zapatistas
Defy Death Threats...
Marcos Slams
"Mega-Project" on Isthmus...
Crowd of
30,000 in Oaxaca City Chants...
"Long
Live the EZLN"
Civil Society
in Juchitán Decorate Abraham and Marcos
The death threat arrived while the City of Juchitán,
Oaxaca was welcoming the 24 Zapatista delegates on their way
to Mexico City. An unsigned letter, claiming to be from a local
criminal-paramilitary group "Corta-Mortajas," or "Cut
Shroud."
"Tomorrow, in Jalapa
del Marquéz, you'll get the shroud-cut."
The Zapatista Command
fired off, later last night, a communiqué announcing that
they would proceed with their travels, and would not be detained
on the way to Mexico City.
But the real response
came from the community of Jalapa del Marquéz itself the
next morning. The entire town lined the main road, including
uniformed schoolchildren, and the town council issued its own
communiqué, stopping all traffic to hand out the one page
flyer. The leaflet told the history of Jalapa del Marquéz,
which hosts a giant reservior and is famous for its "mojarra"
fresh water fish, explaining how the local caciques (local political
tyrants) stole every resource that came from the building of
the dam, and identifying the threatening party as being representative
of the old caciques upset that the Zapotec indigenous population
of that community has organized from below to break the power
of the old bosses.
Members of the community
told Narco News that they credit the Zapatista uprising in 1994
as the beginning of their own efforts to take back their town.
And so, today, the population
gave their thanks with a human wall of protection and cheers
as the Zapatista Caravan came rolling through.
The "Cut Shroud"
group remained in hiding. The smiles and the shouts of the local
schoolchildren chased them away.
The appearance of Subcomandante
Marcos on the Isthmus
of Tehuantepec on Monday in La Ventosa and Juchitán, and
Tuesday in Tehuantepec and in Jalapa de Marquez took on a new
importance due to Sunday's speech by the Zapatista spokesman
that came out squarely against President Vicente Fox's "Plan
Panamá-Puebla" and the related "mega-project"
superhighway on the Isthmus, imposed from above with only superficial
"consultation" of the communities where the project
would be constructed.
This was a new twist in
Mexican events, as Oaxaca - the only majority indigenous state
in Mexico with more than 20 ethnic groups comprising 55 percent
of the state population - could explode over the mega-project
issue in the coming years. The idea from above is to make a "Panama
Canal on Wheels" between the Pacific port of Salina Cruz
and the Caribbean, while inviting agribusiness and other industries
to set up shop along the route, replacing native crops like corn
and beans with eucalyptus and other products that most Oaxaqueños
don't use or even want. Environmentalists have forecast major
ecological problems. Communal farmers face losing their lands
to eminent domain. Nationalists are upset that the Mexican government
has negotiated with Japanese and European companies to build
the highway and charge tolls for the benefit of the privatized
transportation route. And in the area of Juchitán, where
the alternative economic development of the local population
has already built a flourishing economy, years of effort to control
development based on local needs could be erased by this mega-project.
The Narco-Interests are
also salivating that the prospects of this mega-highway: a new,
centralized route for South American cocaine from Pacific to
Atlantic: one-stop private-sector pay-offs and bribery. Once
again, it's the drug-free Zapatistas vs. the Narco State.
By the time the Zapatista Caravan reached
Oaxaca City this afternoon, the entire Alameda alongside the
city Cathedral was overflowing. 30,000 Oaxaqueños, half
of whom are not indigenous, greeted the Zapatistas with all the
volume and enthusiasm that the Beatles were met with when they
first reached America.
Here are some reports
from today's Mexican and International news on the Zapatista
Caravan.
- Al Giordano
From the Caravan
Road with Narco News
Communiqué
Defying
the Death Threats
Originally published in
Spanish by the EZLN
_____________________
Translated by irlandesa
Communiqué from
the Clandestine Revolutionary Indigenous Committee -
General Command of the Zapatista Army of National Liberation.
Mexico.
February 26, 2001.
To the People of Mexico:
To the Peoples and Governments of the World:
To the National and International Press:
Yesterday, February 25,
2001, during the course of the zapatista
delegation's trip through the city of Juchitán, Oaxaca,
we received the
following written message:
"Tomorrow, in Jalapa
del Marquéz, you'll get the shroud-cut."
We entrusted the members
of civil society who are accompanying us with
investigating this threat, and they confirmed that a criminal
group exists
in this part of the country with that name which carries out
assassinations
for money.
Given the above, the Clandestine
Revolutionary Indigenous Committee -
General Command of the Zapatista Army of National Liberation
declares the
following:
First. - No threat will
make us desist from our objective of reaching the
seat of the federal legislative branch in order to promote the
constitutional recognition of indigenous rights and culture in
accordance
with the "Cocopa Legislative Proposal."
Second. - We are making
a courteous call to national and international
civil society and to the federal legislative branch to join in
the march of
indigenous dignity and to prevent, through their presence, any
attack
against the zapatista delegation.
Third. - We repeat that
we are holding Señor Vicente Fox's government
responsible for whatever might happen.
That is all.
Democracy!
Liberty!
Justice!
From the House of Culture
in Juchitán, Oaxaca.
Clandestine Revolutionary
Indigenous Committee -
General Command of the Zapatista Army of National Liberation.
Mexico, February of 2001.
Communiqué
To Other
Armed Insurgent Groups
Originally published in
Spanish by the EZLN
______________________
Translated by irlandesa
Communiqué from
the Clandestine Revolutionary Indigenous Committee -
General Command of the Zapatista Army of National Liberation.
Mexico.
February of 2001.
To the Leadership, Command
Groups and Combatants
Of the Different Political-Military Revolutionary
Organizations in Mexico.
The EZLN is writing you
the following:
First. - As is public
knowledge, on February 25, 2001, a delegation of the
CCRI-CG of the EZLN began a march to Mexico City, for the purpose
of
engaging in dialogue with the Congress of the Union concerning
the
constitutional recognition of indigenous rights and culture.
Second. - During their
trip to Mexico City, the zapatista delegation will
be travelling through the states of Chiapas, Oaxaca, Puebla,
Veracruz,
Tlaxcala, Hidalgo, Querétaro, Guanajuato, Michoacán,
the State of Mexico,
Guerrero, Morelos and the Federal District, according to the
itinerary
which was made public at the appropriate time.
Third. - Since the zapatista
delegation will be crossing through some of
your areas of influence and interest during its trip, the CCRI-CG
of the
EZLN is respectfully requesting that you take whatever measures
you
consider relevant so that this peaceful march can carry out its
high and
just aims.
Fourth. - We are certain
that, even though differences and dissent exist
at various levels, you share in the struggle for the rights of
the Indian
peoples, and you will attend, insofar as you are able, to the
respectful
request we are making of you.
Democracy!
Liberty!
Justice!
From the mountains of
the Mexican Southeast.
Clandestine Revolutionary
Indigenous Committee -
General Command of the Zapatista Army of National Liberation.
Mexico, February of 2001.
By Hermann
Bellinghausen
Isthmus
Supports EZLN
Originally published in
Spanish by La Jornada
______________________
Translated by irlandesa
La Jornada
Monday, February 26, 2001.
Independent Organizations
From the Isthmus of Tehuantepec
Join Zapatista March
Hermann Bellinghausen,
corespondent.
La Ventosa, Oaxaca.
February 25, 2001.
Here, where there are
seven windmills and they are used to generate
electricity, where a strong wind can unexpectedly turn over a
car - and
even more easily carry a man away - independent organizations
from the
Isthmus came to gather together in a flying rally, in order to
greet the
stopover by the Zapatista Army of National Liberation (EZLN)
and to let
them know: "We have decided to join your caravan so your
step might be
joined with ours."
Zoila, a woman in a wide
Isthmus skirt and with a good voice, who belongs
to the Union of Indigenous Communities of the Northern Region
of the
Isthmus (Ucizoni) asked the thousand indigenous gathered at the
crossroads
of the highways to Oaxaca, Matías Romero and Veracruz:
"Let us remain
silent for a moment."
Comandantes David and
Tacho and Subcomandante Marcos were getting out of
the bus, as, following a little behind, was the architect Fernando
Yañez,
invited guest of the EZLN delegation.
The audience - Zapotecos,
Huaves, Mixes, Popolucas, Mazatecos - suspended
their shouts, slogans and comments.
That was when Zoila began
speaking: "Compañeros, before your struggle, we
were not clear. We knew what we wanted, but we did not know
the path.
Your struggle is just. Your path is our path."
The place - a dry, rubbish-strewn
plain with some knots of huisache filled
with pieces of plastic trapped by the wind - would have been
desolate
without all these people with their banners and their presence.
The Oaxaca woman said,
given that they also were demanding the recognition
of their rights as Indian peoples, "we have decided to join
your caravan.
We are asking your permission so that your step might be joined
with our
step."
Large colored banners
identified the organizations which were present: the
Coordinating Group of the Peoples of the Isthmus, the Regional
Council of
Nahua and Popoluca Indigenous Peoples of Southern Veracruz, the
Coordinating Group of Women of Oaxaca and the previously mentioned
Ucizoni,
among others.
The residents of Santo
Domingo Tepetapa proclaimed: "We admire your
courage and struggles for the indigenous." Their banner
was the one
furthest away from the modest grandstand, barely a curb-high
dais, from
where Subcomandante Marcos greeted the most rebellious and dissenting
Isthmus residents, those who are defending the Isthmus of Tehuantepec
from
feverish privatization in a fundamental struggle for national
sovereignty.
Right away the Sup presented
Comandante David, who, with simple but
convincing words, reiterated the reasons for the trip to Mexico
City.
The Federal Highway Police
patrols had to stop, as well as the caravan the
bus had been attracting since San Cristóbal de Las Casas
and Tuxtla
Gutiérrez.
Tlayudas for the Zapatistas
Before the zapatistas
returned to their transportation, the people
presented them with good-sized stacks of tlayudas. And, since
the
zapatistas have been quite accustomed to living on tostadas,
they
appreciated the gesture.
The caravan is growing
every day, between the additions and subtractions of
those accompanying it, and it now takes up dozens of kilometers
and is
paralyzing the areas through which it is travelling for a time.
Some join
in for just a stretch, others say they are going with the Zapatista
Army of
National Liberation delegates for the entire route, to Mexico
City.
This morning in the chiapaneco
capital, Tuxtla Gutiérrez, one would have
had to have seen the Civil Protection employees handing out oranges
- or
the government helicopter buzzing above the caravan non-ominously
- in
order to perceive that the state government of Chiapas has already
changed.
Who would ever have said that Subcomandante Marcos would arrive
in front
of Government Palace and be, not persecuted, but supported?
Then came a reference
to the former governor, Roberto Albores Guillén: "We
want to thank you for having thrown the substitute of the substitute
of the
substitute out of here," said Marcos to the multitude stopped
in the plaza
or poking above the treetops. "This state is no longer
going to be the
country's police blotter or garbage dump," he added.
Emblazoned across a banner
was: "This is zapatista territory." In this
place of so many acts of government and PRI repression, in the
inclement
course of truncated administrations and grotesque interims.
The zapatista caravan
had been bid farewell in San Cristóbal de Las Casas
by thousands of masked indigenous, who immediately returned to
their
communities in resistance, to continue resisting - what else?
After Tuxtla Gutiérrez,
and upon passing Cintalapa, the serpent on wheels
(the metaphor isn't new, but it works) entered Oaxaca.
There, a few things changed:
new companions joined in, women with
'tehuana' skirts appeared among the small crowd, and highway
security
changed hands.
In Tapanatepec, the crowd
stopped the zapatista bus. Comandante Tacho and
Subcomandante Marcos drew near and greeted them through the windshield.
There, PRI campesinos
and State service workers joined in the march, and
not just teachers from the National Coordinating Group of Education
Workers.
Several vehicles and a
State Department of Health ambulance added their
services for anyone who needed them, with the following sticker
on the
door: "The National Union of Department of Health Workers
welcome the EZLN
with fighting greetings in solidarity," and they put doctors
and nurses at
their service for the Isthmus portion of the trip.
During the event in the
central plaza of Juchitán, when night was falling,
the PRDs and 'coceístas' were surprised to see eminent
PRIs (the "enemy")
in the crowd, enthusiastically greeting the zapatista Comandantes.
Eighteen years of government by the Worker Campesino Student
Coordinating
Group of the Isthmus (COCEI) for a political event to reunite
the governing
left and at least some members of the still-official party in
Oaxaca.
Town of Women (and Men)
At the entrance to the
famous city of Juchitán, famous for its social
struggles, and especially for its victories, thousands of persons
waited
for the zapatista caravan this afternoon.
When it arrived, they
accompanied it, walking slowly towards the plaza, in
front of the council building which was decorated with colors
and portraits
of Emiliano Zapata, Che Guevara, Lucio Cabañas, Genaro
Vázquez Rojas and
Subcomandante Marcos, with a background of palm trees adorned
with red
scarves.
Out of the dozens of buses,
cars and trucks which make up the caravan,
descended students from the National Autonomous University of
Mexico
(UNAM), as well as the hard rockers from 99 Posse and their suggestive
tattoos and piercings, as well as senior citizens from the United
States
and young people from Spain, France, Italy and Canada, urban
civil society,
or they had come from the center of the Republic, or they had
joined in
with the zapatistas during their travels through the cities of
Chiapas.
The Party Has Barely Begun
In the plaza where the
rooks were going crazy a la Hitchcock against the
evening sky, speakers -Chontal, Chinantec, Mazatec, Mixtec and
Zapotec, of
course - were greeting the Comandantes.
In this "historic
place of rebellion," as Municipal President Leopoldo de
Gyves called Juchitán in his speech, the 'binixaa' language
and culture are
vitally alive.
The National Democratic
Convention was recalled here, celebrated in the
chiapaneco community of Guadalupe Tepeyac in 1994. Not just
zapatistas,
but De Gyves also played a noted role. And Don Félix
Serdán, the now
hundred year old zapatista veteran and jaramillista (or is it
the reverse?)
even made use - with difficulty, owing to his years - of the
word, before
Comandanta Esther asked all the women present: "Let us
not lose our
consciences."
From woman to woman, the
Juchitecas and the zapatistas gave the 'quién
vive' on issues of strength and resistance, and the world knows
it.
At the end of the event,
Marcos recounted to the very attentive crowd a
history by Old Antonio, which had to do with the origins of language.
Behind his back could be read: "Ma' guiruti' zuxhaata;ee
laanu (No one
shall ever again trample on our dignity)."
Much color and celebration,
and that, according to Leopoldo de Gyves de la
Cruz, when "the party has barely begun."
None
Of Your Business
The
Zapatistas Vs the Moneymen
by Michael
McCaughan
From the Irish Times,
February 26, 2001
The Zapatista movement's
Long March to Mexico City has caused particular discomfort to
Mexico's business class, which has worked hard over the past
seven years to portray the movement as an irrelevance, composed
of "unemployed leftovers" from past failed revolutionary
projects.
As thousands of people
flock to greet the rebel convoy in every hamlet and crossroads
along the way, Mexico's business elite has been forced to reinvent
their view of the rebels, or risk ridicule in the face of overwhelming
national support for their demands. The business bluff lasted
well into February, as Alberto Fernandez Garza, director of Mexico's
influential business council, Coparmex, called the Zapatistas
"a gaggle of armed and masked crazies", worthy only
of a bullet in the head. Mr Garza expanded on his vision of indigenous
inequality, blaming their unfortunate situation on "alcoholism,
machista habits and senseless quarrels."
The money men's loyal
messengers rallied to the cause, led by Ignatio Loyola, Governor
of Queretaro state, one of the planned stopoff points on the
Long March. "Marcos deserves the death penalty" said
Loyola, an opinion seconded by a local National Action Party
(PAN) deputy, who said he knew "several snipers" who
were up to the job. If it achieves nothing else the Long March
has unmasked the ugly face behind the respectable politicians,
entrusted with the good health of Mexico's democratic institutions.
How quickly they reach for their revolvers as soon as democracy
suggests something more substantive than a meaningless ballot
cast every six years.
By the time the rebel
convoy departed from Chiapas (feb 24th) President Vicente Fox
had jumped on the peace bandwagon, welcoming the rebels, pledging
to "put his presidency on the line" for the success
of the march. As a former Coca-Cola executive Mr Fox recognises
the success of the rebel movement in winning the propaganda war,
a victory achieved without a penny wasted on advertising. The
money-grubbers sniffed the wind, consulted private polls, (knowing
well that the much-hyped quickie TV phone-in polls are a useless
barometer of popular opinion) and growled with impotent fury;
'Subcomandante Marcos has won the war against the Mexican government"
whined Sergio Sarmiento, a reactionary economist who, up until
this week, parroted the official line about the Zapatistas, dismissing
them as a tiny, insignificant gang of losers, sustained only
by a mob of dodgy Italian drifters in white overralls. Now however,
Sarmiento's reality has shifted drastically, blasting President
Fox for surrendering the nation to the guerrillas; "the
government has already given away so much,' concludes Sarmiento,
"that it hardly matters at this stage what new concessions
are made. " (to the rebels).
Meanwhile Enrique Quintana,
a management expert writing in the popular daily Reforma, had
the decency to admit that Marcos and the Zapatistas gave him
and his associates 'a pain in the liver". Quintana went
on to outline an 8-point marketing strategy, which he recommends
for inclusion in business school texts, pinpointing the Zapatista's
marketing success, a success he can't help but admire. Such admiration
can clearly be seen in TV, radio and press ads which borrow rebel
phrases and images to boost sales campaigns. "From Chapas
to Marcos", (from "Locks" to "Frames")
reads one eye-catching ad in Mexico City, playing on Chiapas
and Marcos to sell hardware goods.
One furniture shop commissioned
a TV ad showing footage of Marcos and Tacho explaining the rebel
struggle, adding a fresh phrase in which the two leaders rub
their hands gleefully, anticipating a shopping trip to buy a
class of chair unavailable in the jungle. In another ad published
this week a PR agency printed a photo of Marcos and a question;
"Why does he have so much power?' There were three possible
answers, "his weapons? his computer? his image?' The latter
response was the 'correct' answer according to the PR agency,
advertising its own services.
Under the thin veneer
of advertising opportunism however, lies a fist of iron, which
has taken a brief and profitable holiday from its sustained campaign
of hate against the indigenous rebels. The infamous leaked Chase
Manhattan bank memo, (December 94), recommending the Mexican
government "eliminate the Zapatista threat" to please
foreign investors, remains a sacred text for business leaders,
sign-posting the bloody road to Acteal.
The rest is window-dressing.
A Mega-Project
of Truth from Below