Not Even Churches Escape Extortion in Mexico's Ciudad Juarez
 DPA
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January 10, 2010
Ciudad Juarez, Mexico - Parishioners at Vision in Action, a church in the northern Mexican city of Ciudad Juarez, have known for seven months the price of the life of their pastor and the survival of the mental hospital he runs: 2,000 dollars a month. In Ciudad Juarez, just across the US border from El Paso, Texas, religious institutions are no different from restaurants, bars, funeral homes, butcher shops and used-car dealers, who risk being the targets of arson if they fail to pay their "dues."
"They have chased some 60 evangelical pastors away from the city," says Vision in Action pastor Jose Antonio Galvan, 60, sitting in his office.
"They have had relatives killed for not paying, and others have opted to pay, 100 dollars per week and up."
He did not have enough money to pay and fled to the United States, but returned three months ago.
"I couldn't be speaking about faith in the United States if I cannot make you believe that the bigger your problem, the bigger your faith should be," Galvan says. "Now, in Juarez, one is dancing with death, death hugs you, loves you, and if God stipulates that I shall be killed, I shall die."
Demands for "dues" have surged since the government of Mexican President Felipe Calderon declared an all-out war 21 months ago on drug trafficking in Juarez.
In 2009, there were 2,650 slayings linked to organized crime in the city, despite the deployment of more than 8,000 soldiers and 2,000 federal agents, according to local business people.
Across Mexico, the daily El Universal estimates the number of deaths linked to organized crime in 2009 at more than 7,700.
Ciudad Juarez launched a programme this month with the US-based non-governmental organization Crime Stoppers, which allows local residents - known as Juarenses - to make anonymous calls to report crimes and information about criminal activity. The tips are to be passed to federal authorities in the city, regarded as one of the most violent in the world.
"I do not report (crimes) because the authorities do not do their job. They do not protect us, they do not investigate, and many of them are allied with the criminals," says Francisco, a small businessman in the entertainment-sector who asked that only his first name be reported.
Every week Francisco puts aside about 1,000 dollars of his earnings to hand over to an unidentified group of people. Everything would seem almost normal if it were not that, when they show up to collect the cash, they group surround the building with armed men checking each of the entrances.
Francisco is a survivor: Ciudad Juarez is full of businesses that have closed because they did not pay their "dues." And he gets along with his extortionists in a fairly friendly way.
"We are under the law of crime," he says. "I have thought about running away, like many others, but I cannot leave my city in the hands of crime."
The extortion problem, which seems minor compared to killings in the city, often at a rate of a dozen a day, is a major drain on the economy and extends even to social service health centres. More than 50 doctors have asked to be transferred to other cities, according to doctor Leticia Chavarria, head of the Citizens' Medical Committee of Ciudad Juarez.
On Wednesday, Mexicans celebrated the Epiphany. Central Panificadora, a bakery, usually donates a huge roll, traditional for the feast, for hundreds of low-income Juarenses to partake of in a park, but it was attacked for the third time for refusing to pay extortion. The celebrations were cancelled. |
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