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 News Around the Republic of Mexico | January 2006 
Mexico Welcomes Zapatistas' Tour
 BBC News
| An Indian girl next to a mural in the Zapatista community of La Garrucha, in Mexico's southernmost state Chiapas.
"We will listen to people in the places where they work, in the places where they are exploited, where they suffer racism."
--Marcos, Zapatista leader
(AP Photo/Eduardo Verdugo) |
Mexico's government has welcomed a nationwide political tour by the Zapatista rebel movement, saying it will boost the county's democracy.
A spokesman for Mexico's president made the comments as the Zapatistas arrived in the southern city of San Cristobal de las Casas to address local groups.
The Zapatistas' masked leader, Marcos, has pledged to tour all of Mexico's 31 states ahead of presidential elections.
The group will head from San Cristobal into the Yucatan peninsula.
A spokesman for Mexican President Vicente Fox said the Zapatistas' decision to launch the so-called Other Campaign showed the group's determination to contribute to political debate within Mexico.
"It is an achievement of Mexican democracy and Mexican democracy guarantees the free expression of these ideas," Ruben Aguilar said.
"In that sense, it is recognised that the Zapatistas intend, through the political route, to make their points of views and ideas known."
'We will listen'
Marcos says he now wants to be known as Delegate Zero instead of using his more familiar military-style title of Subcomandante.
He led the Zapatistas into San Cristobal de las Casas on New Year's Day on his motorbike called Light-Shadow.
Thousands of rebels and supporters gathered in San Cristobal, in the Zapatista heartland of Chiapas, on Sunday night.
Marcos addressed crowds ahead of the first day of talks with indigenous groups and non-governmental organisations on Monday.
"We will listen to people in the places where they work, in the places where they are exploited, where they suffer racism," he told supporters.
Although his identity officially remains secret, Mexico's government says it has identified Marcos as a former university lecturer.
Twelve years on
The Zapatistas rose to prominence in 1994 when Marcos lead an armed uprising in Chiapas, occupying several towns before retreating into the highlands.
Since then the group has campaigned for greater rights for Mexico's indigenous communities.
The country's central government has granted effective autonomy in several areas of southern Mexico.
Marcos and other Zapatista commanders have vowed that the new campaign will help create a national movement that will "turn Mexico on its head" in an election year.
However, the group has criticised mainstream politicians, and insists it will not campaign for elected office.Fox Says Zapatista Tour Will Strengthen Country's Democracy
Ioan Grillo - Associated Press
San Cristobal De Las Casas, Mexico – Zapatista rebels aboard rickety trucks and buses left their jungle strongholds for the first time in four years to launch a six-month tour of Mexico aimed at reshaping the nation's politics.
About 15,000 rebels and sympathizers, waving banners ranging from black and red anarchist flags to communist hammer and sickles, marched on Sunday to a cathedral in the center of the mountain city of San Cristobal de las Casas, the first stop on the nationwide tour.
As the Indian rebels' ski-masked spokesman, Subcomandante Marcos, prepared to meet with non-governmental organizations and religious refugees in this mountain city on Monday, President Vicente Fox's office said the Zapatista tour would strengthen the country's democracy.
The government "recognizes the Zapatista caravan that is attempting to make its ideas and points of view known by political means," Fox spokesman Ruben Aguilar said.
The president left Monday for his own tour of Indian communities and plans to spend much of the week getting a firsthand look at development programs in several states.
Xochitl Galvez, head of the government's Commission for the Development of Indian Communities, said at a news conference with Aguilar that Fox closed military bases near Zapatista territory and freed jailed rebel sympathizers but that a lasting peace agreement never came because Congress watered down a constitutional amendment for Indian rights approved in 2001.
"Where the resolution of this conflict was held up was in the constitutional reforms," she said, adding that she believes Indian rights are "a pending issue in this country."
"It seems to me that at some time this country will have to begin a new debate about the rights of Indian communities," Galvez said. "There are issues pending about the use of natural resources. There are issues pending about land and territory. There are issues pending about the judicial standing of Indian communities – and these are things that will have to be dealt with at some time."
In speeches Sunday, Marcos railed against the Mexican government and free trade.
The enemy "has many faces but one name: capitalism," Marcos said.
He said the rest of the Zapatistas' tour would consist not of big marches, but of meetings with ordinary people. "We will listen to people in the places where they work, in the places where they are exploited, where they suffer racism," he said.
Clad in a red and white traditional Indian dress and a ski mask, another rebel leader, Comandante Kelly, spoke in favor of women's rights.
"Women are not only for the bed and the kitchen," she said. "We can also wear the trousers."
Marcos roared through the village of La Garrucha on a black motorcycle with a Mexican flag tied to the back and the initials of the Zapatista military army, EZLN, painted in red on the front to start the tour earlier Sunday.
The caravan will head to all 31 states and Mexico City in a bid to impact the July presidential election.
Witnesses said Marcos lost balance on his motorcycle while traveling at low speed on his way to San Cristobal de las Casas and fell, injuring his right hand slightly.
Identified by Mexico's government as a former university lecturer, Marcos has said the tour will allow Zapatista leaders to reach out to leftist groups across the country, creating a national movement that will "turn Mexico on its head."
The rebels have pledged to move away from armed struggle and toward politics, but the group has not clearly defined what form of political participation it will adopt.
Marcos has abandoned his military title in favor of the civilian moniker "Delegate Zero."
It has been 12 years since Zapatistas seized San Cristobal de las Casas and several other Chiapas towns in the name of Indians rights and socialism. A cease-fire with government forces quickly took hold, but there has since been sporadic violence between rebel supporters and other Indian groups in southern Mexico.
This latest tour marks the first time the group has left its strongholds in the jungles of southernmost Chiapas state since a triumphant march to Mexico City in 2001. The Zapatistas largely disappeared from public view following that trip.
Fox ended 71 straight years of single-party rule when he took office in 2000, but is barred from running again. A favorite to replace him during elections in July is former Mexico City mayor Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador, of the leftist Democratic Revolution Party.
In the run-up to the tour, which the Zapatistas call "the other campaign," Marcos has sharply criticized Lopez Obrador. He also has said the Zapatistas won't run for elected office or join Mexico's mainstream political process.
Associated Press writer Will Weissert from Mexico City contributed to this report. |
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