March: Veracruz, the third stele. (An updated viceroy, or the PRD, a left which the right finds acceptable).
29/01/2003
- Opinión
Now it is the wind, and not the hand, which turns the pages of the
calendar. After a momentary disorder, as is law, happy March
appears, blowing one word: VERACRUZ. Above the word, the hand and
gaze follow...
Veracruz. According to the INEGI, in 2000 this state had almost 7
million residents, of which three quarters of a million were
indigenous. Residing in this land are Huasteca indigenous,
Tepechuas, Otomíes-Hñañúes, Totonacas, Popolocas, Mixtecos,
Zapotecos, Mixes, Nahuas, Chinantecos, Mazatecos and Mayozoques.
March: the cloud cedes time to the eagle-sun, and she, with her blue
grace, abandons the skies of Puebla in order to go into those of
Veracruz. The eagle flies along the borders of history and
resistance, the sides of the Eastern Sierra Madre. Below, close to
the Tecolutla River, El Tajín rises up. The bird soars above the
plaza of Arroyo, the ballgames, the plaza of the Pyramid of the
Niches. There the eagle-sun descends to the earth, not in order to
recount a past history, but in order to bear witness to a current
one.
The Pyramid of the Niches, the ancient calendar, now broken and
remade in order to mark the days of present-day Power...with help
from the police and the army.
In Veracruz, the viceroy believes he is up to date, but his method of
governance is the same as the one the PRI has been using, for
decades, to lacerate the lands of Mexico. Here, Señor Miguel Alemán
does not carry out the tasks of government. Busy as he is in
providing pictures and anecdotes for the society pages, he has handed
the government over, in fact, to an Army captain: the Secretary of
Public Security. He is the one in charge of dealing with the
complaints of the citizens of Veracruz and of resolving their
demands. He always has the same response for both: repression.
And, while Governor Alemán is making important decisions (like
choosing which party he is going to attend, which photograph will
show up in the newspapers, which suit he will wear to the upcoming
dance), other things are taking place: potato producers in the state
are losing most of their harvest. To this is added the Sabritas
company's failure to purchase. The results: campesinos without
product and without receipts for their products. Coffee producers in
Córdoba and in other areas of the state have been mobilizing.
Campesinos in Tezonapa are not asking for subsidies, but for
recognition of the real price of coffee. Coffee has reached 40 pesos
per kilo, while campesinos are being paid one peso or fifty centavos.
A man devoted to his public image (and therefore so concerned over
his personal appearance), the viceroy has filled the indigenous areas
of Veracruz with hairdressers. But these hairdressers are wearing
olive green uniforms and carrying G-3 rifles. And, in addition to
carrying out their aesthetic mission, they are entering into business
with drug traffickers and loggers. The hills, thus, are being
scalped, they are combed with narcotics plants once again, and the
acting general's pockets are fattened, after he "pays off" the Señor
Governor.
The "good" federal and state governments (when they allow their work
to appear in the media) are carrying forward a successful economic
policy: Veracruz no longer produces coffee, food, cattle. The
primary export product of this state (like many others in the Mexican
Republic) is now persons. Yes, each week up to 3 buses leave, full
of Mexicans, headed towards the border. Their destination? The
American Union. They are going in search of the food that their own
land, rich as few others are, gives them, but which has been taken
away from them by the voracity made business and government.
Entire families must leave everything, often to be swindled. The
"pushers" frequently offer them housing and good salaries. But when
they arrive they find collective dormitories and paltry salaries.
And, even so, they go. Anything is better than the average 8 pesos a
day they get from their work on Veracruz lands. The crisis of the
small coffee producers has benefited the finqueros, who are then able
to find abundant labor at a ridiculous price. The results: the rich
are fewer in number, but richer; the poor are greater in number and
poorer.
In the Northern Sierra of Veracruz, neither cane, nor pineapple, nor
citrus are achieving a marketable price. What the countryside has
produced the most is migrants, because of the budget cuts. They have
also suffered severe repression from the Miguel Alemán government.
Nonetheless, the transnational organization of Nahuas, Tepehuas and
Otomís is moving forward. The same is true of the municipality of
Texcatepec, with the organization of Otomí comuneros: the Campesino
Defense Committee. In this region, the rebellion of the Hñañúes,
Tepehuas and Nahuas are coming together in the Human Rights Committee
of the Northern Sierra of Veracruz-Radio Huayacocotla, the
Xochitépetl Human Rights Group and the Zapatista Campesino Union.
The area has the enormous advantage of having the only independent
community radio station in the country: Radio Huayacocotla, which
transmits (at cross-purposes with the Department of Government, which
has tried to close it down several times) in Nahua, Tepehua and
Ñyuhú. Texcatepec is the 23rd most marginalized municipality in the
country, it is the smallest municipality in the area and, despite the
fact that it is so poor, they are the people who have most vigorously
resisted Progresa and Procede.
Ilamatlán is another municipality which is always in resistance...as
much as it can be, given that it is only the slightest bit less poor
than Texcatepec. It is the 24th most marginalized municipality in
the country, and the fourth at the state level. Official figures
note that more than 95% of the populace of the municipality of
Ilamatlán is unemployed. This municipality has come close to
reversing the national percentage between employed and unemployed,
which means that, for every twenty persons of working age, only one
has an opportunity to do so.
In Ixhuatlán of Madero, following the repression which took place on
June 14, 2001 (when the contingent of more than seven hundred men and
women were attacked, who had been marching on that day to Xalapa in
order to demand the building of a hospital in Campo la Mata, close to
their communities, and not in the urban corridor - as the governor
wanted), the indigenous communities of this municipality decided to
form the Ixhuateco Indigenous Front, in order to fight against the
savagely repressive responses of the Miguel Alemán Velazco
government.
The problem in the countryside in Veracruz can be summed up in three
words: exploitation, repression and corruption.
Because those who do not leave, resist and fight. There is the
Popular Indigenous Council of the Sierra of Zongolica which, joining
together bilingual teachers and other social activists, is trying to
become an alternative of civil and peaceful struggle.
In southern Veracruz, Nahua communities grouped together in the
Popular Front of Southern Veracruz, are resisting and organizing.
In Coyutla, 90% inhabited by Totonaca indigenous, corruption,
discrimination and repression produced something quite logical:
rebellion. There the Coyuteco Citizens Movement, formed by the
people, was born and carries on. Yes, by the people, period. There,
without regard to political parties, citizens have organized, they
are discussing, reaching agreements, and carrying forward their
demands. Since the end of the year 2000, their demands for an end to
corruption and discrimination have been met by threats, beatings and
bullets. The Coyutecos, as a result, formed an Autonomous Municipal
Council. When one of their meetings was attacked by government
gunmen, the women went out to confront them and put them on the run.
These are some of their words:
"The people are willing to continue fighting. They aren't afraid
anymore, because we are organized. We have demonstrated that we are
stronger than whose who buy consciences and those who have looted our
town. Our cause is justice with dignity and respect for our
autonomy. We Totonacas have many ways of resisting, through dance,
music, fiestas, through community work (which here we call "mano
vuelta"). Clothing, rites, myths and stories are part of the
resistance. All of this helps us to keep our culture alive, and to
defend our rights as Totonaca peoples."
And more:
"The courses of action which we see are: reaching a solution for the
problems that were included in the Cocopa Law, the definitive
cancellation of the Cumbre Tajín event for commercializing the symbol
of our culture, and achieving the recognition of our Autonomous
Municipal Council."
Just a moment! Did they say El Tajín? Isn't that where Viceroy Alemán
boasted about having achieved the modern commercialization of
history?
Yes. Señor Miguel Alemán makes fun, not without a bit of shame, of
those who make their living from the sale of crafts. He doesn't sell
crafts, he sells entire archeological zones. Although, certainly,
there is no dearth of wet blankets:
In the Totonacapan region, in Papantla, activities are being carried
out in defense of the Mexican cultural heritage and, in particular,
of the archeological zone of El Tajín. All of this at cross-purposes
with Miguel Alemán's government, which is proposing the privatization
of the entire zone. Alemán's objective is the color green, as in
dollars. The primary public and client of the onerous events in El
Tajín are foreign. But the Front for the Defense of the Cultural
Heritage (made up of various organizations) has repeatedly denounced
that the government project is attempting to level the area, in order
to erect a five star hotel and a casino for international tourists.
The commercialization of El Tajín is, also, its destruction. Each
time that Señor Alemán mounts his "chows," prehispanic plinths are
broken in order to erect daises and banks of floodlights. The INAH
is an accomplice, because it gets a cut as well.
As part of its struggle, the Front for the Defense of the Cultural
Heritage has filed legal charges against the viceroy, which the
"justice" system filed in the cabinet under "I" for "impossible,"
"inconvenient," "irreverent." But below, those who fight are
continuing in the "R" of "resistance" and "rebellion."
Remodeling work is also going to be needed in the urban areas, since
the marginalized areas are increasing.
In Poza Rica, a land lacerated by oil wells and pro-management
unions, the past and present memory of resistance is being preserved.
From the struggles of 1934 and 1958 to the fight and death (stained
by the despicable conjectures) of Digna Ochoa. And so Pemex workers,
teachers, health care workers, housewives and religious persons are
meeting, discussing and agreeing on activities concerning the
dissemination of information and in defense of the culture.
In textile areas like Río Blanco, Nogales and Ciudad Mendoza, there
is much discontent because of the lack of employment. Workers in
Nogales took the factory away from the owner, but they have not
received any government help to get it up and running. In Ciudad
Mendoza, there are workers who have been continuing to fight against
its liquidation for more than 10 years. In Río Blanco, employment is
uncertain, because the factory is running one season and closing
others, the workers' contract has been modified and now they are
working under conditions similar to those of Porfirio Díaz' time. In
Nogales, in response to the citizens' fight against having water from
their spring diverted to the industrial parks, the Miguel Alemán
government accused them of "sedition" and put them in jail.
In the Tezonapa region, they didn't want to recognize concessions for
transportation workers of the Tuxpango Valley, despite the fact that
is they who provide service to the communities. In Ixtaczoquitlan,
they have been fighting for some time against the pollution caused by
Apazco Cement, while congenital diseases and spontaneous abortions
have been increasing around the cement factory.
In the Orizaba region, the entire town is confronting unemployment,
since the industrial corridor is failing (of 5 textile factories,
only one is functioning), and businesses like the beer and cement
industries and Kimberly have cut back many jobs. Retired persons are
protesting over the ridiculous pensions they are receiving, which
aren't enough for anything, and they are saying that they won't vote,
because, while officials are getting good salaries, they are giving
them just a pittance for 30 or 40 years of work. The urban
transportation system is planning a price increase. The lack of
housing is a successful business for private construction companies,
who have the support of the state and municipal governments.
Nonetheless, work is being carried out here in support of migrants
("Ricardo Zapata" Support Committee for Migrants), of women who are
being subjected to violence and of sex workers (Cihuatlahtolli -
Woman's Word), in addition to the Woman's Organization of Jalapilla.
These women were the ones who were in charge of food and security for
the Zapatista March as it went through Orizaba.
The zapatista march...Orizaba...
If they told us that we could return to one place which we had
visited during the march, but only one, we would choose Orizaba.
Various fortunate circumstances came together there: some open,
tolerant and inclusive organizers, active and committed NGOs,
activist indigenous communities, local media which were especially
sensitive to the indigenous cause and a particularly noble people
(made up of young students, workers, housewives, residents and
employed persons).
The results? What had been going to be a quick greeting from the
March of the Color of the Earth turned into one of the most festive
and spirited events of the entire trip. Not just in the plaza, but
also in the street. All the colors, all living, were there.
All of them, even gray...
Prior to that, in December of 2000, and after the EZLN had publicly
announced its intention to march to DF, during one of the meetings
where the PRD legislative wing was discussing the San Andrés Accords,
Deputy Rosario Tapia spoke thusly: "Compañeros, it's essential that
we come to an agreement with the PRI and with the PAN in order to
work out the San Andrés Accords, in order to prevent the EZLN
comandancia from coming to Mexico City. That would be fatal for the
PRD, and, on the other hand, it would be a victory for them and not
for the Congress. And even less so for us."
A little later, when the march was getting underway, during the PRD
CEN Executive Committee meeting, the PRD spokesperson (and current
national Secretary General of that party), Navarrete, stated: "The
primary danger for the PRD would be the EZLN's turning into a
political party. The longer it takes to approve the law, the better
chance we have that zapatismo will be isolated."
What started as an isolated proposal turned into a decision in
Orizaba.
Orizaba, year 2001, the plaza is full...
In a corner are two political individuals: Senators Jesús Ortega
(leader of the PRD wing in the Senate) and Demetrio Sodi de la Tijera
(PRD member of the COCOPA). The Orizaba plaza has always been a
difficult place for political demonstrations, and the two senators
are here in order to bear witness to the zapatistas' failure to
convene. With their faces ashen and shaken, they watch the people
and listen to them. They then look at each other, understanding that
everything possible must be done in order to insure that this force
ultimately never...ever... enters the public arena.
On one side, Jesús Ortega, a native of Aguascalientes, former
faithful follower of Rafael Aguilar Talamantes in the Socialist
Workers Party, Deputy from 1979 to 1982, expelled from the PST in
1987, member of the PSM and later of the PSUM, once again Deputy from
1988 to 1991. In 1989, he joined the court closest to Cuauhtémoc
Cárdenas. Since 1993, his work in the IFE has allowed him to be
linked with PRD groups in the states. From 1994 to 1997, he was a
Deputy once again (at that time he was coordinator of the PRD wing).
He was a courtier of Cárdenas until 2000, when even he advised him to
retire (today he is one of his primary detractors). Now he is a
Senator of the Republic and coordinator of his party wing in that
chamber.
Without having ever led any social sector, without any intellectual
output, without any rhetorical gifts, without any charisma
whatsoever, Senator Jesús Ortega is a great example of the leaders of
the Revolutionary Democratic Party.
On his right, Demetrio Sodi de la Tijera, from the DF, former
director of public and private companies, General Coordinator of the
DDF in the times of Ramón Aguirre, entered the PRI in 1975. He was a
federal deputy for the PRI when the Salinas fraud against Cárdenas
took place. He was a PRI assembly member - with Salinas' blessing -
in the second Local Assembly of the DF (91-94), and he was part of
Manuel Camacho Solís' group until he failed to gain the PRI's
presidential nomination. He left the PRI in 1994 following the
Colosio assassination. He was a leader of Civic Alliance in 1994 and
a member of the San Angel Group that same year. In 1996, he
participated in the State Reform Forum (organized by the EZLN) with a
presentation in which he predicted that the PRI would be remaining in
power for quite some time and that only joint PAN and PRD candidacies
would be able to defeat it. Encouraged by Cárdenas' victory, he
joined the PRD in 1997. He was a PRD deputy from 1997-2000, and he
is now holding a senate seat for the 2000-2006 term. As a senator,
he has, in addition to promoting the indigenous counter-reform,
attempted to reach agreements with the PAN regarding privatization of
the electricity industry. He voted against renegotiating the
execution of NAFTA's agricultural section, and he not infrequently
spoke out against rebel campesinos in San Salvador Atenco.
A few days ago, the political analyst, Armando Bartra, made a kind of
assessment of NAFTA's 9 years and of the EZLN's public presence. I
will not waste time criticizing the frivolous and superficial
analysis of zapatista initiatives, except for one point: the teacher
Bartra said that we should not be looking for "Lulas" (in reference
to the current president of Brazil) in our politicians, but we must
fight, not just from below, but also from "above" (meaning in the
chambers) for the transformation of Mexico. I agree about not seeing
"Lula's" face in the politicians. But it also seems to be an error
to see the face of the Brazilian PT in the Mexican PRD. And where is
the equivalent of the Rio de Janeiro MST (Movement of Those Without
Land)?
It appears that the only argument in support of the need to help the
PRD is that there isn't anything else. That if they are not helped,
then the PRI and the PAN and the mother of death, sectarianism and
all kinds of disasters, would rain down on us. Recently, in response
to criticisms made by the 7 EZLN comandantes and comandantas of the
PRD this January 1, the president of that party, Rosario Robles,
called for there to be no fighting among "friends." She insisted that
their voting for the indigenous law had been an error and had been
recognized as such.
"Friends?" "Error?"
As can be gathered from the fanatical defense made by Senators Ortega
and Sodi of the indigenous reform (when neither Bartlett nor Cevallos
were defending it any longer, given the major national and
international repudiation), it was not a "tactical error." According
to Ortega and Sodi's vision, it is really not very important that the
communities' status as "entities of public right" is not recognized.
Nor that the "collective enjoyment of natural resources" is not
spoken of (according to Ortega, it's unnecessary!), including
regarding territory, since "habitat includes the territorial."
Given all the above, the complaints and opposition by the Indian
peoples of Mexico against the Law, which the senators wanted, and
want, to limit to "people close to the EZLN and the Subcomandante,"
simply come down to the Indian peoples not understanding the "wisdom"
of the PRD legislators.
But the fact is that the senators of the Mexican left defended a law
which is of the right. And, when Señor Cárdenas Solórzano indicated
that he would vote for the indigenous counter-reform ("Are you a
senator from the EZLN or from the PRD? Vote for party unity!" he
might have said, forgetting that senators are not from the EZLN, but
nor are they from the PRD, from the PRI nor from the PAN, but
senators OF THE REPUBLIC), he did so for a law of the right.
The alternative was clear: either with the Indian peoples (and the
millions of non-Indians who supported their demands) or with the
indigenous counter-reform of Cevallos-Bartlett-Ortega. And the PRD
chose, and it chose according to the nature it has constructed: that
of a left which is acceptable to, and complicit with, the right.
The approval of the Cevallos-Bartlett-Ortega Law (by the way, none of
them were elected by vote - they entered the Senate as a party
quota), that is, of the PRI-PAN-PRD law, was, in effect, a victory
for the Mexican political class against the Indian peoples (and not
just against the EZLN), but a pyrrhic victory, since it has
evaporated now in the face of advances in the processes of autonomy
and of resistance which are taking place not just by the indigenous.
Did the PRD deputies "save themselves?" Fine, the vote against the
counter-reform was agreed to in the parliamentary wing of the Chamber
of Deputies with a difference of just 3 votes. And the PRD deputies
have been approving various things which have to do with the counter-
reform.
But, now in the arena of the hypothetical, thinking that yes, it was
just a "small error" which we should forgive as "friends," then what
is the meaning of the following?
1) The PRD has been voting in favor of the federal budget for three
consecutive years. They justify themselves by noting that they have
not been Fox's original programs. The reality is that a budget is
mandated in the Department of Treasury which they already know is
going to be "modified" by the deputies (tiny increases in education,
health, etc.), thus ensuring their vote. If it is true, as economic
theory holds, that the budget represents the economic model in
action, then the PRD has been voting in favor of neoliberalism and
against Mexicans for three years. Their vote has meant voting in
favor of paying the external debt, of limiting growth, of faithfully
following the dictates of the International Monetary Fund and the
World Bank.
2) PRD deputies are putting into practice those accords which
received a majority vote concerning the indigenous law, as regards
both regulatory laws and budgetary, or line, items. They voted
against them, but they are guarantors for the implementation of that
law.
3) In the Senate, the PRD voted in favor of modifications to the
International Convention concerning disappeared persons, thus
guaranteeing military jurisdiction (soldiers will only be judged by
military tribunals) and not retroactivity, thus guaranteeing
impunity.
4) Last December, several PRD senators (Senator Sodi, among others)
voted with the PAN and the PRD in rejecting demands for NAFTA's
agricultural clause to be suspended.
5) Just to give an idea of the extravagance of the PRD's internal
elections, a 30 second spot on López Dóriga's news show, on Televisa,
cost 465,000 pesos. Brigadistas (who were often gang members from
various poor neighborhoods) were paid 60 pesos per hour during the
day for hanging up campaign materials, and 80 pesos per hour at
nighttime for taking down their rivals' materials. It has been
calculated that the PRD's previous campaign cost close to 80 million
pesos.
6) Señor Ramirez Cuellar, from El Barzón, one of the "leaders" of the
current campesino movement, was he not a PRD candidate for the
Venustiano Carranza delegation in the DF, which is, obviously,
populated primarily by campesinos? How many of the PRD candidates for
various positions were once social leaders? How many PRD candidates
in the delegations did not even appear on the poll tickets? How much
did the candidates spend who made appearances on radio and
television? How much was spent on the plane which promoted one of the
candidates?
7) A party of the left resorts to polls in order to elect its
candidates and leaders? A party of the left promotes names and faces
instead of principles and programs? Is it not true that 67% of the
municipalities which the PRD won were then lost in the following
election, because they governed just like the PRI and the PAN? Is it
not a fact that the PRD's words are not "reaching" young people, the
indigenous, environmentalists, women, the new campesino movement?
What is the PRD's clear position on international matters?
The PRD, it is true, was once a party of the left. Not now. It has
opted to join (at the back of the queue) the position of the
political class, and it aspires only to be the weight which changes
the balance, forgetting that the owner of the scales doesn't give a
damn about that. It has now tied itself structurally to the
apparatus of the State, and it is economically, that is, politically,
dependent on it. A new class of politicians has been formed inside
it, and it is doing everything possible to hold on to it. There are
no longer principles, nor programs...nor, ergo, any party.
The zapatistas are not unaware of the fact that there are many honest
and committed people in the PRD (we salute them). But it is not they
who are deciding the direction and nature of that political
institution.
Over and over we are told: that's tough, there's nothing else. But,
as Comandante Tacho said on January 1, YES, there is something
else...
From the mountains of the Mexican southeast.
Subcomandante Insurgente Marcos * Translated by irlandesa
Subcomandante Insurgente Marcos * Translated by irlandesa
https://www.alainet.org/fr/node/107035
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