Mexican farmers protest conditions

by Stan Gotlieb

By dawn’s early light on Sept. 15, after six months of occupation by partisans of the organization Campesino Indigena Popular de Oaxaca (People’s Indian Farmers of Oaxaca: CIPO), a combined force of federal and state police forcibly dismantled what by everyone’s judgment were two ugly encampments in the city center. They did it by force, and 14 farmers were arrested.

Located in strategic positions within the city center—in front of the state government palace and at the corner of the Santo Domingo church plaza near the main tourist thoroughfare of Macedonio Alcalá—the encampments were an ugly hotchpotch of plastic tarps and political banners. Speakers blared day and night, condemning the government, globalist financial policies and the NAFTA “free-trade” agreement, and playing the music of sympathetic performers. People cooked, washed clothes and slept on grass mats. For the first time in my memory, there was even a recorded message in English, played several times a day for the benefit of the tourists, explaining the situation and asking the listener to phone government officials who have thus far ignored the plight of CIPO members, and hundreds of thousands of their brethren.

Since 1994, when the Zapatistas came down out of the mountains of Chiapas and onto the world news scene, the essence of the complaint has never varied much: native Mexicans—much like native peoples everywhere—are treated whenever possible as if they don’t exist. Their culture is trampled, they are enslaved—first as a conquered people and more recently as wage slaves in the assembly plants—and forced off their land, either through “eminent domain” actions or because they can no longer make a living as farmers due to the internationalization of agriculture.

This kind of protest is clearly bad for business. It’s bad for government business, which is conducted mostly through the back door of the building when there are large protests going on in front; and it’s bad for tourism, detracting as it does from the colonial architecture and tranquility that draw foreign visitors. Unfortunately for both government and tourism, the right to protest is enshrined in the Constitution written after the revolution of 1910—1919; and “plantones” (encampments) have been occurring ever since. It is a tradition: you come to the seat of government seeking redress, and you wait until they get around to recognizing that you are there and decide to deal with your complaint.

Sometimes—particularly in small towns up in the mountains—a group of you take up machetes and forcibly remove the governing faction from their offices, occupying the government building until you are recognized, or until the army comes to remove you in turn. In the case of this latest plantón in Oaxaca, a certain amount of strain was introduced into the social fabric. Most recognized their right to be there, but at the same time wished they would go away.
Local art maven and self-styled Oaxaca cultural commissar Francisco Toledo joined the Federal Antiquities Commission (INAH) and the Federal Electricity Board (CFE)—the demonstrators were tapping into electric lines without paying, a practice far more honored than decried—in demanding the removal.

Toledo, a reputed millionaire from the sale of his paintings, along with Alfredo Harp, a banking billionaire, is the best known philanthropist in town, having spent a small part of his fortune on highly publicized urban renewal projects and cultural events. In an interview with “El Imparciál,” “just minutes after” the removal, he said CIPO was damaging the city’s patrimony (Oaxaca is a UNESCO “cultural legacy” city), and the tourism industry. One wonders if this concern for the physical preservation of Oaxaca wouldn’t be better directed toward the growing problems of graffiti, traffic jams, air pollution and acid rain deterioration, all of which do far more serious damage to both the buildings and squares, and the tourist atmosphere.

Why is the protest broken up today? Could it have anything to do with the fact that that at 11:00 p.m. on that very same day, Sept. 15, the governor steps out on the balcony of his corner office, and leads the crowd in “El Grito,” a shout of “Viva Mexico”? This is the hour when Miguel Hidalgo, one of the leaders of a failed revolution against the Spanish—it took ten years before a successful overthrow was managed—uttered those very same words. I can certainly understand why the governor would not wish to look down, not on a sea of well-dressed, celebratory people, but on a bunch of peasants lolling around under their makeshift shelter.

Of course the issue is not so simple. Do not the people have a right to celebrate their revolutionary heritage? Every year that I have attended, the entire area around and inside the Zócalo has been jammed. Since tourism is the largest single source of income in Oaxaca (remittances from illegals working in the United States is second), shouldn’t the tourist be treated to the tranquil scene promised in the guidebooks and government tourist bureau brochures? The debate rages on.

Meanwhile, the CIPO is back, only this time they are relegated to the grass inside the park. In a typically stupid move, the government has used “crowd control” barriers to block off the entire street between the park and the government palace. Before, tourists could at least pass in the street. Now they have to go around the block, or cross deep into the park.

A resolution of sorts is being prepared: a new state government complex is being constructed in the Oaxaca suburb of Xoxocatlan. One acquaintance that works for one of the state bureaus told me that the move was prompted by “parking problems” and (wink) “protests.” It looks as if Oaxaca will end up with fewer protests—and the native campesinos will become even more invisible.