ALBERTO RUZ BUENFIL Huehuecoyotl, Santo Domingo Ocotitlan, Tepoztlan, Morelos. MEXICO. April 14th. 1996.
The policies favored by State governor, General Jorge Carrillo Olea and his political advisers,of letting time pass by without giving any resolutionto the just demands of the Tepoztecan villagers, dividing the population, buying some of the local leaders and threatening the life and freedom of others, choking the municipal economy and using the state of Morelos resources to pay for an abnoxious media campaign against the freely and democraticaly elected Ayuntamiento Libre, Constitucional y Popular of Tepoztlan seemed to be a succesful estrategy as it has turned out in other parts of the country.
After eight months, the first enthusiasm was beginning to dim and a certain numbness and apathy was starting to win and destroy the spirit of many Tepoztecans. Tourism, the main source of local economy, diminished on an 75%, and construction, one of the main sources of jobs, became practicaly inexistent. The people's elected authorities were also put against the wall, on one side by a government trying constantly by all means to disauthorize them, and on the other side by several thousands of citizens asking them for a prompt solution to their demands & problems.
Nevertheless, the fire of this popular revolt was never extinguished. A small group of convinced environmentalists and fighters for democracy kept the ambers red under the grey shadows of doubt, division, fear & insecurity.Members from the CUT (Consejo de Unidad Tepozteca), and the Ayuntamiento Libre, led by charismatic ecologist Lazaro Rodriguez CastaÒeda, continued the fight within the legal terms against the powerful KS group which insisted in building a Golf Course, several five stars hotels & restaurants and 800 residential villas in communal protected lands from the Tepoztecan Municipality.
Governor Carrillo Olea, first beneficiary from the construction of the megaproject, abusing from his powers offered the KS national & international investors to deal and convince by any means necessary the proud Tepoztecans, or to force them to yield by the use of force.
The game seemed to have reached until the morning of April 10th, the stage of stalemate. But on that day, something ocurred that is changing dramatically, as it happened on the same day in 1919, the course of contemporary history in Morelos..and in Mexico.
On April 10th. 1996, the President of Mexico, Ernesto Zedillo attempted to conmemorate the 77 anniversay of the murdering of revolutionary general Emiliano Zapata Salazar in the state of Morelos, and his host, general Jorge Carrillo Olea, dreading that his image could be challenged by the just protests of the Tepoztecans, gave orders to his various repressive groups, granaderos, judiciales and members from his Policia Preventiva to stop the villagers before they could reach the town of Tlaltizapan where the event was to take place.
On that morning, ignoring Carrillo Olea's program, nearly 800 Tepoztecans, especially children, women and elders,left their village in dozens of buses, vans and private cars, the girls dressed as adelitas from the 1910's revolution and the boys disguised as original zapatistas with their fake mustaches, cardboard machetes and plywood rifles. The women took with them crowns of flowers to leave as offerings in the various sites where the legendary peasan's leader Emiliano Zapata had riden in his white horse 77 years before in his way to Chinameca, the hacienda were president Venustiano Carranza had him ambushed and murdered in 1919.
After peacefully leaving their flowers at the feet of the statue of Zapata in the city of Cuautla, the caravan of Tepoztecans took a secondary road to Villa de Ayala, when suddenly, in a desertic place called San Rafael they found a roadblock made up by several hundred uniformed, armed policemen and many other undercover ones (the numbers go from 200 to 500 in total) who said they had orders not to let them pass and reach Tlaltizapan.
Some villagers descended from the buses and began arguing with the forces of law & order, defending their constitutional rights of free transit & expression, and at a certain point of the discussion, the chief of Police, Juan Manuel AriÒo gave orders to his ambushed forces to disperse & shoot the protesters. The infuriated uniformed cops began then to viciously beat, insult & threaten the children, women and elders, bullets went on flying in all directions, and after a few minutes, several people were lying wounded on the ground, and dozens of Tepoztecans were reduced & thrown as heaps in the back of various police vans.
For more than four hours, the road was blocked and the access to ambulances, families of the villagers & journalists forbidden. Only at night, when the public appearence and official conmemoration led by president Zedillo and general Carrillo Olea in Tlaltizapan had finished, the wounded were taken & dispersed in various hospitals of the state and more than 40 Tepoztecans were taken to jail to be interrogated & processed for supposed aggressions against the police forces.
It was a misfortune to general Carrillo Olea's plans and attempts to show a clean state to president Zedillo that among the Tepoztecans there were two foreign journalists, a french and a spaniard, and a local CUT member with an amateur videocamera that were able to film and document what really went on in San Rafael. And as a result of their evidences and declarations, next day, the front page of national newspaper La Jornada showed the picture and the story of the Tepoztecans being ambushed a few miles away from the place where Emiliano Zapata was murdered exactly 77 years before.
It was also a misfortune to general Carrillo Olea's attempts to show how it had been the armed Tepoztecans who were the aggressors to his poor unarmed officers, that their weapons were cardboard and plywood children toys and that among the victims of his police brutality there were several people seriously wounded by bullets & beatings and a 65 years elder, Marcos Olmedo Gutierrez, member from the PRD, first declared dissapeared, whom a few hours latter was found dead with a bullet in his neck and obvious signs of torture in his body.
From than moment on, the political scene in Morelos changed drastically. President Zedillo was compeled to ask the intervention of the National Commission of Human Rights, and their veredict was conclusive: the fault was on the police, not on the Tepoztecans.
Two days latter, on Saturday April 13th, the first page of most national & local newspapers had coverings of the story and its new consequences: the megaproject of KS and its Golf Course was definitevely cancelled, the police chief Juan Manuel AriÒo, six high officers and 60 cops were put in jail accused of abuse of power, damages & lesions, robbery of personal belongings, destruction of vehicles and murdering of Marcos Olmedo.
After one day of public exposure of a grey coffin covered by his political party's yellow banner, Marcos Olmedo's rests, surrounded by his widow, children & grandchildren, and by dozens of fellow members & companions from the PRD. were placed in the main plaza of Tepoztlan. And thus, the villagers's spirit of struggle was rekindled.
Hundreds of people, Tepoztecans and supporters from all over the country, demanded then and demand now the official cancellation of the Golf Course project, the recognition of their own elected authorities, the liberation of four political prisoners kept in jail since January by Carrillo Olea's personal orders, and an inmediate end to the persecution of their leaders, and, specially, a political trial against the governor himself.
Yesterday, the body of Marcos Olmedo, who became an instantaneous symbol and martyr of the Tepoztecan's ecological struggle, was buried in the graveyard of the small town of Santo Domingo, one mile away from our own ecovillage of Huehuecoyotl. He was our neighbor, and as a gesture of solidarity, members from our community and recognized intellectuals such as author Carlos Monsivais, historian Antonio Garcia de Leon and green activist Armando Mojica from Espacio Verde were present at his burial. To escort Marcos to his last residence, back to Mother Earth.
For Marcos the struggle has finished. And as an elder woman was saying to his afflicted grand daughter: Now he is happy because he is finally stopped suffering. He is now in the arms of the Lord. His cortege in the dusty alleys of Santo Domingo Ocotitlan was led by a local music band playing political tunes, and followed by several hundreds of us, local and national unknown fighters for a better future for the coming generations.
When Marco's coffin was descending into the earth, one of his friends, tears choking in is gorge, read a poem dedicated to him, and then ended his reading saying: Marcos, your seeds are right now germinating in the hearts of many of us. You are not leaving us, you are giving us the strenght to continue: MARCOS VIVE, LA LUCHA SIGUE!. ZAPATA TAMBIEN VIVE, LA LUCHA SIGUE Y SIGUE.. (Marcos is alive. The struggle continues. And Zapata is also alive, the struggle continues and continues..!)
Alberto Ruz Buenfil is a member from an ecovillage, Huehuecoyotl, located in the community of Santo Domingo Ocotitlan, Tepoztlan, Morelos. He is also linked to GUARDIANES DE LA TIERRA, a national green network who is hosting the first Bioregional Gathering of the Americas this year, from the 17th November to the 24th, precisely in the Municipio Libre de Tepoztlan.
We ask you to reproduce this communique and if you are interested in the gathering, contact: Beatrice Briggs: Turtle Island Office. 4035 Ryan Road. Blue Mounds WI 53517. USA. Tel: (608= 767.39.31) Fax (608= 767.39.32) and E-mail: Beabriggs@aol.com Por todas nuestras infinitas relaciones O MTA KU OYASIM