El Enemigo Común

Mexican activist also arrested say police threatened them

August 7th, 2007 - Barucha Calamity Peller writes: The four Catalans who were taken off the street in Oaxaca City at 9:30pm on Sunday, August 5th, the night of the state legislative elections, by police in 5 different red and white ford lobo trucks without license plates, are said to have been sent to immigration authorities. Their physical and legal status is unknown.

A Mexican citizen, Damian Reséndiz Saucedo who was arrested with them and who is a member of an activist radio collective in Mexico City, gave the flowing testimony of his arrest:

“We were violently forced into the back of the trucks, under threats they invited us to meet ‘the real Oaxaca’….they never asked us for identification, they put us face down, and during the transfer to the clandestine jail where the police took us with our heads covered, the police insulted them for being Spanish and me for being from Mexico City.”

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3 people taken off the streets on election night still not found, among them 2 Catalans and 1 Mexican

August 6th, 2007 - Barucha Calamity Peller writes: Last night at approximately 10 pm, while the votes were being counted that confirmed a PRI sweep of the state legislative elections, three people were taken off the streets of the Zocalo in Oaxaca City by police. Among them were two Catalans and one Mexican woman. Their status is still unknown over twelve hours later, and they have not been found in any jail. There is no other confirmed information surrounding their arrests.

The elections, in which almost 80% of the Oaxacan population abstained from voting, came as a disappointment for the APPO’s “punishment vote” campaign against the PRI.

Police presence was extremely heavy in the streets of Oaxaca City last night and today.

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Oaxaca is Not Over

August 4th, 2007 - Barucha Calamity Peller writes:

“Don’t let another six months go by before the world turns around and sees Oaxaca again.”

-APPO representative Eric.

Has the world forgotten about Oaxaca?

Political activity, from repression to organizing, is still just as present as when the Oaxaca uprising was visible in the streets, but with the appearance of normalcy in Oaxaca City it seems that many of us have begun the process of forgetting or assuming that the Oaxaca struggle is over.

Walking on the streets of Oaxaca it is indeed hard for the untrained eye to see the continuing struggle for autonomy.

The tourists have returned, the graffiti has been painted over, and the barricades are a burning memory. And perhaps it is a failure that on the left we need dramatic events and repression in order to recognize important political transformation, and in this sense we become part of the dangerous process of forgetting.

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Remaining Movement Media Outlets Continue to be Sabotaged by the Government

Barucha Calamity Peller writes: Today, August 1st, 2007, thousands of women marched in Oaxaca City, Oaxaca, Mexico, on the one year anniversary of the historic takeover of the Oaxacan television station, Canal 9, by APPO (Popular Assembly of the Peoples of Oaxaca). The spontaneous television occupation last year sparked a series of radio station takeovers in which the Oaxacan movement essentially seized and utilized the majority of mainstream media outlets in the capital.

The march today comes at a time in which the movement’s few remaining media outlets after the late October invasion of the Preventive Federal Police are under grave threat. Radio Planton, the movement’s largest radio run by the Section 22 teachers union and other movement participants, has regular signal interruptions believed to be caused by the state government. Oaxaca Libre, an independent media website, is regularly sabotaged.

But the march today focused more on the participation of women in the Oaxacan popular movement to oust governor Ulises Ruiz and impose a popular form of governing.

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Ruiz’s protested government is forced to pay state workers to fill Guelaguetza auditorium; tens of thousands march in Oaxaca City despite recent repression

July 30th, 2007 - Barucha Calamity Peller writes: Today, on the 30th of July tens of thousands of people from the APPO (Popular Assembly of the People of Oaxaca) and the 22 section of the teacher’s union along with sympathizers participated in a protest against — and demand a popular boycott of — the official Guelaguetza festival. This festival has been the subject of conflict since the uprising in Oaxaca began last year. The Guelaguetza is a dance and cultural festival meant to reflect the traditions of the diverse indigenous population in the state of Oaxaca. However, the government of Ulises Ruiz, the governor ousted by popular demand but who refuses to step down, co-opted the festival as a tourist attraction heavily sponsored by multi-national corporations.

The protest, which began from the outskirts of the city, circled around Cerro de Fortin, where the government of Ulises Ruiz held the official Guelaguetza, although the state government had to pay state workers and others in order to fill the Guelaguetza stadium in face of the successful boycott.

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One Person Confirmed Dead, 62 Detained, Disappearances

July 16th, 2007 - Barucha Calamity Peller writes: Today in Oaxaca City, Oaxaca, a confrontation between the APPO (Popular Assembly of The Peoples of Oaxaca) and security forces of the State of Oaxaca as well as Federal Preventive Police has left at least one movement participant dead as a result of police violence, at least 62 detained, and an unknown number of people disappeared. (see: 1 | 2)

According to an APPO press statement released today, the police launched “a broad offense” against the people of Oaxaca who were celebrating their alternative and popular Guelaguetza (an annual Oaxacan cultural festival) in the Guelaguetza auditorium. The APPO announced two days previous that it would hold an alternative cultural festival in the main Guelaguetza auditorium, located in the Fortin Mountain outside of the city.

Federal Preventive Police and State police surrounded the perimeter of the Guelaguetza auditorium in order to prevent people from entering the festival. A caravan heading to the festival, tailed by 10,000 people, arrived to the auditorium, and in that moment the police attacked the crowd with tear gas, rocks, sticks, whatever they had in their hands, as well as with unidentified explosive projectiles. People retreated, and the police advanced, beating and arresting people. Three photographers were reported to have been beaten. Countless others were tossed into the back of police pick up trucks with serious injuries.

Video, Lunes del Cerro, by Mal de Ojo TV: part I | part II

APPO’s Press Room | Indymedia Oaxaca | Mal de Ojo TV | Nodo de Derechos Humanos | Indymedia Chiapas | Centro de Medios Libres | Narco News

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Jun 15th, 2007 - Barucha Calamity Peller writes: At around five in the morning on Thursday, June 14th, 2007 hundreds of fireworks cracked the quiet dawn and burst in the sky above Oaxaca City, Mexico. Though the streets remained still, people began waking up and movement chants could be heard coming from the windows of houses. “If Ulises doesn’t go there will be no peace!”.

This isn’t like any other day in Oaxaca. Thursday marked the one year anniversary of the violent attempted eviction by the state police of the Section 22 teachers sit in strike in the Zocalo, and what happened that day set off a chain of events that led to a statewide uprising and a popular movement with millions of participants to remove the right-wing governor Ulises Ruiz from office and replace the entire state government with popular assemblies. An organization of thousands of civil groups was formed, called the Peoples’ Popular Assembly of Oaxaca (APPO). Physically removing local governments from office, the APPO lived autonomously in the capitol city and other communities for nearly five months until the entrance of the Preventive Federal Police in the last days of October.

In the early afternoon of June 14th, 2007, a megamarch of over 300 thousand participants began to arrive in the Zocalo of Oaxaca City. The march began at the airport nearly 8 kilometers away, and as the beginning of the march entered the Zocalo people were still leaving from the airport. Contingents from Chiapas and Michoacan and other states in Mexico participated in the march as well.

Photos of the March and the Barricades

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April 30, 2007 - Barucha Calamity Peller writes: At approximately 5pm, Radio Universidad in Oaxaca City, Mexico, was re-occupied by sympathizers of the Popular Assembly of the People of Oaxaca (APPO) and students from different departments of the Benito Juarez Autonomous University. With protest songs and political information, the transmissions were initiated to spread information about the different mobilizations planned for the first days of May. May 1st, an international labor holiday, teachers from union section 22, together with other social organizations, will march to the Zocalo in Oaxaca City to protest the continuing governance of Ulises Ruiz Ortiz, ousted by popular demand since June of last year.

The radio hosts are asking for support from students and the general public to reinforce the radio installations and take security measures in case of state repression. The radio hosts are saying that the radio and the university will be occupied for the next two days.

Listen Online (may not work yet…)

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