While the rest of the country keeps very busy debating (or rejecting) the so-called energy reform, in Oaxaca Ulises' boys attack again. This time two young women were shot dead at black point.
They worked as reporters for an independent communitarian radio station. The main goal of this media is to promote cultural customs of triqui people. The problem is that triquis are among the most harassed in Oaxaca, and all of Mexico.
Their struggle started long before Oaxaca uprising of the past years, perhaps from the mid 50s of last century. They were, and still are people with strong links to their culture and way of politically organising.
Being reluctant to embrace modern life and also being situated in one of Oaxaca's richest sites in natural resources posed a problem for governors. Either, they had to respect their autonomy and move on, or they allowed the utilisation of their resources and make use of alternative methods to 'convince' the indigenous not to 'interfere' with progress.
Sadly, most of the governors opted for the second choice. So it is not a surprise to find paramilitary groups in the area, along and supported by the federal army and the state police.
They worked as reporters for an independent communitarian radio station. The main goal of this media is to promote cultural customs of triqui people. The problem is that triquis are among the most harassed in Oaxaca, and all of Mexico.
Their struggle started long before Oaxaca uprising of the past years, perhaps from the mid 50s of last century. They were, and still are people with strong links to their culture and way of politically organising.
Being reluctant to embrace modern life and also being situated in one of Oaxaca's richest sites in natural resources posed a problem for governors. Either, they had to respect their autonomy and move on, or they allowed the utilisation of their resources and make use of alternative methods to 'convince' the indigenous not to 'interfere' with progress.
Sadly, most of the governors opted for the second choice. So it is not a surprise to find paramilitary groups in the area, along and supported by the federal army and the state police.
In that sense the assassination of indigenous political leaders, communicators working for the community and trying to reinforce triqui's culture and traditions present a risk of having an organised movement at some point in time. So the killing has to continue while resources and big firms' interest in them last.
This report is from propaganda press! link
here (comment by wet_ahuizote)This report is from propaganda press! link
In Mexico, two women journalists have been killed in the southern state of Oaxaca. Teresa Bautista Flores and Felicitas Martínez were returning from a reporting assignment when they were ambushed by attackers. The victims both worked the indigenous community station called The Voice that Breaks the Silence. The Trique indigenous community in Oaxaca’s San Juan Copala launched the station earlier this year.
Mexico 9 April 2008 Reporters without Borders
Reporters Without Borders is deeply shocked by the fatal shooting on 7 April in Putla de Guerrero, in the southern state of Oaxaca, of Teresa Bautista Flores, 24, and Felicitas Martínez, 20, two women journalists working for La Voz que Rompe el Silencio (“The Voice that Breaks the Silence”), a community radio station serving the Trique indigenous community.
“Although there is so far no evidence that these two women were killed because of their work as journalists, their murders will be traumatic for all of Latin America’s many community radio stations, which are too often ignored or despised by the rest of the media and by governments,” Reporters Without Borders said.
“We are conscious of the risks run by the press in Oaxaca state, where the political climate continues to be tense, where two journalists were killed in 2006 at the height of a period of social unrest, and where other community media have been attacked,” the press freedom organisation continued. “We hope the investigators quickly establish the circumstances and motives for this double murder and catch those responsible. And we join their community in paying tribute to the two victims.”
La Voz que Rompe el Silencio was launched by the Trique indigenous community in San Juan Copala (in the west of Oaxaca state) on 20 January, a year after the locality was granted administrative autonomy. The community appointed Bautista Flores and Martínez to manage and present the radio station, which is dedicated to promoting indigenous culture.
The two young women were returning from doing a report in the municipality of Llano Juárez in the early afternoon when they were ambushed and, after being threatened with abduction, were finally shot with 7.62 calibre bullets of the kind used in AK-47 assault rifles, Reporters Without Borders was told by CACTUS, an organisation that supports indigenous communities. Investigators found 20 bullet casings at the scene. Three other people were wounded in the shooting - Jaciel Vázquez, aged 3, and his parents.
“We are convinced the Oaxaca government was behind all this, with the intention of dismantling municipal autonomy,” a community spokesman told CACTUS, which has called on the federal authorities to intervene.
The Mexican branch of the World Association of Community Radio Broadcasters (AMARC) said there have been acts of violence against other small radio stations belonging to indigenous groups in Oaxaca, such as Radio Nandia in 2006 and Radio Calenda in 2007.
Two journalists were murdered in Oaxaca during a major wave of protests against state governor Ulíses Ruiz Ortíz in 2006. They were independent Indymedia cameraman Bradley Will, shot on 27 October 2006, and Raúl Marcial Pérez, a indigenous community leader and columnist for the regional daily El Gráfico, who was shot on 8 December 2006.
No one was brought to justice for either of these murders, in which the authorities curiously ruled out any possibility of their being linked to the victims’ work as journalists.
Community Radio Activists Murdered in Oaxaca
from Micro Radio Network
April 7th, 2008. Oaxaca, Mexico.Two indigenous triqui women who worked at the community radio station La Voz que Rompe el Silencio (The Voice that Breaks the Silence), in the autonomous municipality of San Juan Copala (Mixteca region), were shot and murdered while on their way to Oaxaca city to participate in the State Forum for the Defense of the Rights of the Peoples of Oaxaca. Three other people were injured.
According to the State Attorney General, the victims are Teresa Bautista Merino (24 years old) and Felícitas Martínez Sánchez (20 years old).
Francisco Vásquez Martínez (30 years old), his wife Cristina Martínez Flores (22 years old), and their son Jaciel Vásquez Martínez (three years old) were also injured in the attack.
According to prelimary reports, the women had left the station, which is part of the Network of Indigenous Community Radio Stations of the Southeast (Red de Radios Comunitarias Indígenas del Sureste), around 1:00 PM. They were travelling in a truck on their way to Oaxaca city, but were ambushed on the outskirts of the community Llano Juarez.
The two community radio activists were supposed to coordinate the working group for Community and Alternative Communication: Community Radio, Video, Press, and Internet, at the State Forum for the Defense of the Rights of the People of Oaxaca, which was to begin the today (Wednesday) in the auditorium of Seccion 22 of the teachers union in Oaxaca.
The Center for Community Support Working Together (CACTUS as the spanish acronym) released a communique denouncing the murders and demanding that the state authorities investigate and punish those responsible for the crime.
The state attorney general said that 20 bullet shells, caliber 7.62, were found at the site of the murders, along with other arms including an AK-47.
People are encouraged to contact their local embassies and consulates (or to organize demonstrations at their local embassies and consulates) to express their condemnation of this paramilitary repression of indigenous women and community media projects.
from narco news,.. a report of triqui movement towards autonomy, which I strongly believe has all to do with the assassinations,... and perhaps the comming violence
By Nancy DaviesCommentary from Oaxaca
January 28, 2007
January 28, 2007
The Triqui indigenous community of Oaxaca declared its autonomy on January 21, 2007 after the election of its municipal authorities. The election process required two months to complete. The new municipal president is José Ramírez Flores with vice-president Leonardo Merino, constitutional mayor Severo Sánchez and secretary Macario Merino. Six others were named to the new Council of Elders (Concejo de Ancianos).
The chosen new government will employ the traditional indigenous practice of usos y costumbres used among the Triqui, with a council of elders and decisions made openly in assemblies. The authorities will meet with the leaders of the 20 communities which form San Juan Copala, as well as with the Council of Elders, so that decisions can be made
The autonomous government has formed despite death threats against Ramirez and other leaders of the Triqui community who formed the autonomous municipality. In a January 21 interview with the daily La Jornada, Ramirez specifically cited the deception and oppression practiced by local political bosses (known as caciques) in the nearby towns of Santiago Juxtlahuaca, Putla de Guerrero and Constancia del Rosario, which have stayed outside the new autonomous municipality. One day before the new authorities assumed office, paramilitary groups burst into town and shot up the place. Worse, they ambushed Roberto García Flores, assassinating him on route to San Juan to participate in the new municipality.
Many consider the grip of the caciques as the greatest obstacle to peaceful development in Oaxaca. The United Popular Party, (PUP, in its Spanish initials) and the leaders of the Unified Independent Movement for the Triqui Liberation (MULT, in its Spanish initials) control the greater part of the local treasury in the area. Ramírez claims that more than half of received government funds go into their pockets and that MULT and its chief leader Heriberto Pazos are mentioned as stealing resources which should have gone into the relief of poverty for the Triquis.
Therefore, many people support the autonomous community as an act of rebellion against the caciques and their hired gun, identified as the deputy Rufino Maximino Zaragoza, who is accused by representative Edilberto Hernandez Cárdenas, of the Unified Independent Movement for the Triqui Liberation Independiente (MULTI, in its Spanish initials), of being responsible for the killing of more than ten people since March of 2006, the majority of them children between the ages of six and fifteen. Shootings among indigenous and campesino populations have been ignored by state authorities who declare virtually all deaths to be internal, or land boundary, disputes.
Autonomy is a complicated matter anywhere; it’s even more complicated given that the Triqui peoples split off a smaller group, a division fought against by the ruling Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI, in its Spanish initials), which believed itself in complete control of Triqui areas. The PRI has been repressing the autonomists ever since.
The autonomous group MULTI dominates five of the municipalities within the new autonomous community of twenty. The MULTI came into existence on April 20 of 2006, and affiliated with the Popular Assembly of the Peoples of Oaxaca (APPO, in its Spanish initials). MULTI leaders and activists of the region documented the death or disappearance of 20 of their members, assigning responsibility to paramilitary groups sponsored by the governor Ulises Ruiz.
The other fifteen member towns are non-MULTI. Those remaining entirely outside the new autonomous entity remain predominantly in the control of the original MULT.
The other fifteen member towns are non-MULTI. Those remaining entirely outside the new autonomous entity remain predominantly in the control of the original MULT.
As a political entity, the new autonomous community of San Juan Cópala thus far exists only in the determination of the MULTI and united Triqui to maintain it. Its principal objective “is to achieve that our people, countrymen, brother Triquis, may continue struggling for our liberty and thus demand that the state authorities recognize our autonomous government and award us the economic resources that belong to us.”
That statement was given by the new president, José Ramírez Flores, in an interview given to La Jornada and published on January 22, 2007. Ramirez went on to say his challenges are to maintain the unity among the Triquis of the Mixteca region and to combat the daily violence in the community.
Historically, in the 1970s an organization formed to unite the Triqui around social issues. From that “Club,” the MULT emerged. In 2003 it opted for the formation of a political party to run for office and won at the ballot box. The PRI then threw all its power into infiltrating and corrupting the MULT, which was absorbed into the Popular Unity Party (PUP, Partido Unidad Popular). The consequent split between Triqui groups resulted in MULT and MULTI. I was taken aback during the spring of 2006 when I realized that the deaths of three Triquis were not counted among the death toll of the APPO which stood at 11 at that time, apparently because the murders were not directly attributed to the same paramilitary or plainclothes police who were shooting known APPO members. But according to reports, these Triquis (two adults and a young boy) had just left an APPO meeting. That is, one can assume they were MULTI adherents, killed for affiliating with the APPO. But they were not counted as “victims” of the government repression because they were supposedly shot by fellow Triquis, the MULT-PRIistas.
The majority of recent attacks against the residents of San Juan Copala have been against a secondary school, the municipal market, and the Catholic church. As in past “land disputes,” no state assistance to apprehend the criminals has been forthcoming. Abandonment and extreme misery and poverty, accompanied by repression against the Triqui, are the normal state of affairs, according to Edilberto Hernández Cárdenas, spokesperson for the new municipality.
With this declaration of autonomy by the twenty united communities, Edilberto Hernandez explained, they will reclaim the category of “free municipality” which they held in 1826 and which in 1948 was grabbed by the PRI government. MULT, originally formed as an alternative, betrayed the communities when it entered alliance with the PRI, and the rift is yet to be healed.
The state of Oaxaca refuses to recognize the newly constituted municipality, which raises the question of how San Juan Copola can negotiate for its share of state funding. The obvious issue is that the new entity wants all the legal funding to which it is entitled to get down to the base, without it being siphoned off by PRI operatives. One might wonder how that could take place under the current PRI governor, who is fighting for his political life. Nevertheless, Ramírez speaks of negotiating.
“If the state government does not want to recognize us, we will have to resort to another type of action. We want to negotiate, but if it’s not possible, we will carry out marches, meetings, and encampments, until they give us recognition.”
The APPO has congratulated the autonomous municipality. In that context, the attempt to achieve working unity among the twenty (of the thirty-six) Triqui communities of the Mixteca region, who have chosen to constitute the new municipality, is now paramount. Internal unity is placed above any political party, as modeled by the APPO. In other words, in the new municipal body they will act only as Triquis. According to La Jornada, Ramírez Flores was chosen president of the new municipality after three months of discussions among the leaders of the twenty participating Triqui communities, a month more than the “election” timeframe.
The San Juan Copala municipality unifies San Juan Copala, Yoxoyuzi, Santa Cruz Tilaza, Guadalupe Tilaza, Tierra Blanca, Paraje Pérez, El Carrizal, Sabana, Yerba Santa, San Miguel Copala, Yutazani, Unión de los Angeles, Río Metates, Río Lagarto, Cerro Pájaro and Cerro Cabeza, among others, for a total of about 15,000 indigenous people. Including the sixteen communities that remain with MULT, the total Triqui population is about 24,000.
The twenty unified communities placed a paid advertisement in Las Noticias when the autonomy was announced (and it was posted on Narco News). In it, the language affirmed solidarity with all Triquis. The implicit plea is to quit fighting among themselves for the scraps and crumbs that the PRI has shared out. The majority of the Triqui now want to start looking in a new direction. The sixteen non-participant communities that remain in the PRI can be wooed.
The swearing-in ceremony was celebrated by state and national guests, including the Indigenous Front of Binational Organizations, the National Unit Against Neoliberalism, The Peoples Popular Assembly of Oaxaca, the Francisco Villa Popular Independent Front, Section 22 of the National Teacher’s Union, the Extended Front of the Popular Struggle, the Popular Revolutionary Front and dozens more.
It is interesting to note that in Oaxaca, unlike Chiapas, the movement to “autonomy” does not mean withdrawal from contact with the official government, but rather a conquest of that government, in particular as equal members of the APPO. Joining the APPO reflects the demographics of Oaxaca where not only does the majority of the population have indigenous roots, but the majority of the population, in all its ethnicities, is in open revolt against the PRI, as we saw in the voting of July 2, 2006.
