Lourdes Garcia Larque is a solidarity activist and graduate of Latin American studies from the National Autonomous University of Mexico, which has 300,000 students. She will be speaking at the Third National Conference in Solidarity with Latin America in Melbourne on October 1. Garcia Larque spoke to 91×ÔÅÄÂÛ̳ Weekly's Nick Hamilton.
According to Garcia Larque, although "supposedly you can be free and wear a Che Guevara T-shirt all the time if you want", the government "acts very harshly" to repress social movements in Mexico. "Every day there is a different march blocking the main roads, going to government buildings, making demands to the government against privatisation, health services, education, and pay rates."
Garcia Larque explained that police often send government agents to act as provocateurs at protests, who "will start fighting the police, which will then give the police an excuse to break the protest up. The police are not like the police here, they have assault rifles, batons, they'll beat people up and use tear gas at public protests ... Some other activists are put in jail without reason and others are murdered."
Garcia Larque cited the example of lawyer and political activist Digna Ochoa, who was murdered in 2001. "She used to defend students, poor people and workers and worked for free most of the time because people cannot afford lawyers. The government made public this case, saying that she had psychological problems and that she committed suicide, which is not true as I think it's very difficult to shoot yourself four times in the leg and once in the back of the head, especially with the left hand when you are a right-handed person."
Garcia Larque has known other students who were killed because "the government is basically against indigenous people and campesinos. For example, there are hundreds of political prisoners ... in jail in Mexico for no other reason than that they demanded that the government fulfill its obligations."
"In the countryside", Garcia Larque said, "government paramilitary forces have committed several massacres of indigenous people and campesinos, the most famous of these being Aguas Blancas in Guerrero in 1995 and Acteal in Chaipas in 1997".
In April 2004, Garcia Larque's classmate Pavel Gonzalez, "who was 20 years old and a student activist and Zapatista supporter, was killed by a paramilitary group that has state backing. He was tortured and killed near the university. The police claimed that it was a suicide, but even the state coroner disagreed with this." According to Garcia Larque, there are "dozens of murders like this every year, yet despite the state terror", the government's "ever greater acts of injustice" compel more and more people to become activists.
Presidential elections will take place in Mexico in 2006. "If the elections are not rigged", Garcia Larque believes that Mexico City mayor Lopez Obrador will win. Obrador "is not leftist but is more progressive in some aspects, and the things he proposes are things that must be done if the next government wants to continue with capitalism". Mexico has "a huge economy because of the natural resources and industry, but now even the World Bank and the United Nations have recognised that the way that capitalism is composed in Mexico can't go on. The structure of capitalism in Mexico has only increased the discontent amongst the people and social problems have increased."
Garcia Larque described neoliberalism as the "latest phase of capitalism". She says it "has created huge injustices due to inequalities and has left a large proportion of the population in misery". The handing over of state utilities and services to private companies, especially US multinationals, has "left even more people without basic services, [and with] greater unemployment and much more state terror to control the growing discontent of the people."
"The agricultural sector used to be a dynamic part of the Mexican economy but nowadays most of the rural workers cannot even support themselves, as they cannot compete against heavily subsidised US farmers. The North American Free Trade Agreement has destroyed the country for the people but has made it a paradise for large multinational corporations."
According to Garcia Larque, "Mexico is a complex society, so there are many different groups that have formed, like independent unions, mainly because the official unions work in alliance with the government. Some of them are very strong, like the electrical trade union and the teachers' union. Of course the most well-known social movements are the armed guerrilla groups like the EZLN [Zapatista National Liberation Army], whose demands used to be very local and focused on rural indigenous problems."
Recently, Garcia Larque said, the EZLN has been "working together with other groups to form a broad national agenda that is much more inclusive and with structural demands. Another important and more radical group is the EPR [Revolutionary People's Army] and its split-off group ERPI. They propose the taking of power and socialism. Many social organisations identify with either the EZLN or the EPR, and among these are several autonomous communities. These communities have kicked out all state authority from their community and govern themselves through community councils. This may not be the best form of government, but in these communities crime rates, including murder and drug trafficking, have dropped dramatically."
Garcia Larque helped to build a clinic in San Jose del Rio, in the mountainous region in Chiapas, where there are many Zapatista autonomous communities. "In this area", she explained, "it is very peaceful because there are no state terrorists attacking the people. The people work hard to construct their services and develop their community because they know the government will not give them services."
Garcia Larque called on people in Australia to join solidarity events like the October 1 conference in Melbourne (visit ). She also said that political prisoners' rights groups are keen for solidarity activists to send protest letters to the Mexican government, such as the Comite Cerezo (visit ). "There are also products made in autonomous communities such as organic coffee and indigenous hand crafts, which can be purchased directly from these communities."
From 91×ÔÅÄÂÛ̳ Weekly, September 28, 2005.
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