Are we all
Zapatistas?
Continued
from page12. Link to previous page 12 
The
EZLN stopped making demands for constitutional rights from the
Mexican government in 2001 and began to form a state within a state.
This is described by Marcos in Chiapas: The Thirteenth Stele
as involving the withdrawal of the EZLN from civil matters and
establishment of self-governing villages or Autonomous
Municipalities, with recallable and rotated functionaries. In August
2003, the ‘Juntas of Good Government’
were formed. These are regional councils which take the functions of
administering justice, taxation, healthcare, education, housing,
land, work, food, commerce, information and culture, and local
movement from the EZLN. Marcos states that there have been
improvements in living conditions as well as improvements in gender
equality in the notoriously patriarchal peasant societies since the
formation of ‘Juntas of Good Government’.
However,
the war is not over as EZLN recruitment and guerilla warfare training
continues. The U.S. Department of State’s
Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights, and Labor report for 2004
highlights instances of state and local police involvement in
kidnappings and extortion, torture, unlawful killings,
narcotics-related crime and the trafficking of illegal migrants in
Chiapas. The report also states that there were numerous allegations
of the use of excessive force and the violation of international
humanitarian law against the Mexican Army as well as continued
violence by paramilitary groups.
There
is also US involvement in the Chiapas rebellion which is perhaps of
no surprise given the proximity and the fact that Mexico has the
third-largest proven crude oil reserves in the Western Hemisphere and
is the third-largest foreign supplier of petroleum to the United
States, behind Canada and Saudi Arabia. PEMEX, the state-owned oil
corporation, is a vital source of revenue for the Mexican state which
is heavily indebted to the banks in the USA. Oil fields with one
billion barrel potential have recently been discovered in Chiapas.
According
to the Federation of American Scientists’
Arms Sales Monitoring Project direct commercial sales of defence
articles (e.g. machine
guns, rifles, pistols, grenade launchers and ammunition) and defence
services (e.g. missiles, rockets, torpedoes,
bombs, mines and tanks) amounted to $112million and $436million,
respectively, in 2003. The US military also spent $1.25million on
training the Mexican Army in 2003. The US training programmes are
officially for counter-narcotic operations, however the Mexican Army
have been observed using techniques learnt from the US military
against the EZLN in Chiapas.
From
the initial uprising the EZLN has publicised their struggle using the
printed media and the internet. The writings of Subcommandante
Marcos are available in many different editions and languages. The
Chiapas conflict has become a celebrated cause for many activists
across the world and has, in part, been shaped by the involvement of
activists. The Mexican Army’s ceasefire
has been attributed to the protests in Mexico’s
urban centres far away from the Chiapas. The presence of peace
observers mostly drawn from Zapatista support groups in the USA and
Europe, as well as Mexico itself, is thought to have prevented
excessive violence and intimidation by the Mexican army in Chiapas.
So
well-known across the world is the name and image of the Zapatista
that co-operatives in the Zapatista communities are producing and
marketing their own brand of coffee which is distributed in Europe
through various ethical shopping outlets. In 1994 The
Independent (1
March)
reported that Zapatista t-shirts, dolls and even condoms bearing an
image of Marcos and the word ‘uprising’
have been marketed. In 2001, workers of a trendy clothing shop in
Covent Garden selling Zapatista-inspired merchandise spray-painted
Zapatista imagery and slogans on walls around major shopping areas in
central London as well as dressing up as Zapatista guerrillas
to hand out advertising material.
For socialists there are
several encouraging
things about the Zapatista movement: their apparent reliance on
direct democracy and the solidarity shown to them by workers across
the world. However, it is clear that the Zapatistas think their
rallying cry of ‘democracy, liberty and
justice’ can be fulfilled whilst the
greatest amount of wealth, all it commands, and that we all depend
upon remains in the hands of a minority.
So
are we all Zapatistas? The workers and peasants of Chiapas have
experienced some of the worst poverty and violence that humans have
inflicted on each other. Workers across the world experience poverty
and violence to some extent on a daily basis –
it is the common bond that transcends national boundaries. This
feature of our class-based society, an inevitable result of the
social relation of worker to capital, has never been abolished by
national liberation, state capitalism or ‘good’
government. The Zapatistas’ desire for
real democracy is commendable, however, this should not be limited to
defence of perceived or actual gains within capitalist society but
for the abolition of capitalism and establishment of world
socialism.
PIERS
HOBSON
To
contents Page 14
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Socialist Party
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