Marcos Responds to Left Critics;
A Penguin in the Selva Lacandona
Originally published in
Spanish by the EZLN
*************************************
Translated by irlandesa
(The Zapatista struggle is
just a little house, perhaps the smallest, on a street called "
You're not going to believe
me, but there's a penguin in the Ezeta Headquarters.
You'll say "Hey, Sup, what's up? You already blew the fuses with the Red
Alert," but it's true. In fact, while I'm writing this to you, he (the
penguin) is right here next to me, eating the same hard, stale bread (it has so
much mold that it's just one degree away from being penicillin), which, along
with coffee, were my rations for today. Yes, a penguin. But I'll tell you more
about this later, because first we must talk a bit about the Sixth Declaration.
We have carefully read some
of your doubts, criticism, advice and debates about what we posited in the
Sixth. Not all of them, it's true, but you can chalk that up, not to laziness,
but to the rain and mud that's lengthening the roads even more in the mountains
of the Mexican Southeast. Although there are many points, I'm only going to
refer to some of them in this text.
Some of the primary points of
criticism refer to the so-called new intercontinental, to the national Mexican
nature of the Sixth, and, along with this, to the proposal (it's still just
that, a proposal) of joining the indigenous struggle with that of other social
sectors, notably with workers in the countryside and the city. Others refer to
the definition of the anti-capitalist left and to the Sixth's dealing with
"old issues" or using "worn out" concepts. A few others
warn of dangers: the displacement of the indigenous issue by others and,
consequently, the Indian peoples being excluded as the subjects of
transformation. The vanguardism and
centralism that could arise in the politics of alliances with organizations of
the left. The replacement of social leadership by political
leadership. That the right would use zapatismo
in order to strike a blow at López Obrador, in other words, at the political center (I know
that those observations speak of AMLO's being on the
left, but he says he's in the center, so here we're going to take what he says,
not what they say about him). The majority of these observations are well
intended, and they seek to help, rightly warning of obstacles in the path, or
rightly providing opinions as to how the movement which the Sixth is trying to
arouse might grow.
Concerning cutting and pasting
I will leave aside those who
are lamenting that the Red Alert didn't end with the renewal of offensive
combat by the EZLN. We are sorry that we didn't fulfill your expectations of
blood, death and destruction. No way, we're sorry. Perhaps another time...We
will also leave aside the dishonest criticisms. Like those who edit the text of
the Sixth Declaration so that it says what they want it to say. This is what Señor Victor M. Toledo did in his article "Overweening
Zapatismo: Sustainability, indigenous resistances and
neoliberalism," published in the Mexican newspaper La Jornada (
Well, the parts which Señor Toledo edited out of the Sixth stated the opposite.
For example, in the part which recognizes the existence of resistances and
alternatives to neoliberalism in Mexico, and in first place in the enumeration
of them, it notes: "And so we learned that there are indigenous, whose
lands are far away from here in Chiapas, and they are building their autonomy
and defending their culture and caring for the land, the forests, the
water." Perhaps Señor Toledo was expecting a
detailed account of those indigenous struggles, but that is one thing, and it's
another very different and dishonest thing to say that there was not one single
reference. In the account made by Señor Toledo of the
efforts of those with which the EZLN decided to join, he has cut out the first social
group to which the Sixth refers, which says, verbatim: "And then,
according to the agreement of the majority of those people to whom we are going
to listen, we will make a struggle with everyone, with indigenous, workers, campesinos, etcetera."
In addition, the first point of the Sixth precisely states: "1.We are
going to continue to fight for the Indian peoples of
Concerning we don't want you in this barrio
There are also those
criticisms, although more hidden, that the Sixth Declaration makes reference to
some international issues and the manner in which they are addressed. And so
some people criticize the fact that we refer to the blockade which the
In any event, does it not
seem natural that, in a movement which is primarily indigenous like the Zapatista,
sympathy and admiration would be evoked by what the indigenous in
The Sixth Declaration does
not speak to the institutions of above, good or bad. The Sixth is looking
below. And it is seeing a reality that is shared, at least since the conquests
made by
Concerning we don't want you on this street
There are also (I shall note
and summarize some of them) those criticisms for trying to "nationalize
and even internationalize" our discourse and our struggle. The Sixth, they
tell us, falls into that nonsense. Therefore recommending that the EZLN remain
in Chiapas, that it strengthen the Good Government Juntas and that it confine
itself to the waterproof compartment that is their lot. That once that project
is consolidated, and once we have demonstrated that we can "put into
practice an alternative modernity to that of neoliberalism in their own
lands," then we can set forth on the national, international and
intergalactic arenas. In the face of those arguments, we present our reality.
We are not trying to compete with anyone to see who is more anti-neoliberal or
who has made more advances in the resistance, but, with modesty, our level and
contributions are in the Good Government Juntas. You can come, speak with the
authorities or with the peoples, ignore the letters and communiqués where we
have explained this process and investigate, first hand, what is happening
here, the problems which are confronted, how they are resolved. I do not know
before whom we have to demonstrate that all this is "putting into practice
an alternative modernity to that of neoliberalism in their own lands," and
who is going to characterize us con palomita o tache, and then,
yes, allow us to come out and attempt to join our struggle with other sectors.
Besides, we had the
premonition that those criticisms would be praise...if the Sixth had declared
its unconditional support of the political center represented by López Obrador. And if we were to
have said that "we are going to come out in order to join with those
citizens' networks in support of AMLO," there would be enthusiasm,
"yes," "of course you have to leave, you don't have to stay shut
away, it's time for Zapatismo to abandon its hideout
and join its experiences with the masses devoted to the one-in-waiting." Hmm...López Obrador.
He just presented his "Alternative National Project" to the citizens'
networks. We are suspicious, and we don't see anything more than plastic
cosmetics (and which change according to the audience) and a list of
forgettable promises. Whatever, perhaps someone might tell AMLO that he can't
promise "the fulfillment of the San Andrés Accords," because that
means, among other things, reforming the Constitution, and, if my memory
serves, that is the work of the Congress. In any event, the promise should be
made by a political party, noting that its candidates will fulfill it if they
are elected. The other way there would have to be a proposal that the federal
executive would govern above the other branches or ignore them. Or a dictatorship. But it's not about that. Or is it?
In the politics of above, the
programs seek, during election periods, to add as many people as they can. But
by adding some, others are subtracted. Then they decide to add the most and
subtract the least. AMLO has created, as a parallel structure to the PRD, the
"citizens' networks," and his objective is to add those who aren't
members of the PRD. AMLO has presented 6 persons for those citizens' networks
who are going to coordinate, at a national level, all those non-PRD lopezobradoristas.
Let's look at two of the "national coordinators."
Socorro Díaz Palacios, Under Secretary of Civil Protection in the
Carlos Salinas de Gortari government.
On January 3, 1994, while the federales were perpetrating the Ocosingo
market massacre, he stated (I'm citing the Department of Government Press
Bulletin): "The violent groups which are acting in the state of Chiapas
display a mix of national as well as foreign interests and persons. They
demonstrate affinities with other violent factions which are operating in
Central American countries. Some indigenous have been recruited, pressured by
the chiefs of these groups, and they are also undoubtedly being manipulated as
regards their historic claims which should continue being dealt with." And
further on: "The Mexican Army, for its part, will continue acting with
great respect for the rights of individuals and of peoples while giving a clear
and decisive response to the demand for order and security...blah, blah,
blah." In the days that followed, the Air Force bombarded the indigenous
communities south of San Cristóbal de Las Casas, and the federal army detained, tortured and
assassinated 3 indigenous in the community of Morelia,
at that time in the municipality of Altamirano,
Chiapas, Mexico.
Ricardo Monreal
Ávila - In January of 1998, just a few days after the
Acteal massacre, the then PRI deputy and member of
the Permanent Commission of the Congress of the Union "commented that the
Zapatista Army of National Liberation (EZLN) is a paramilitary group, the same
as those who killed the 45 Tzotzil indigenous on
December 22, 1997 in Chenalhó, Chiapas. 'Because everything that acts like an Army without being
one and arms itself as civilians is paramilitary. They
all must disarm, because they have all contributed to this unnecessary, unjust
and stupid violence which has had all Mexicans in mourning,' he stated" (El Informador
of Guadalajara, Jalisco. 3/1/98). Days later, after
moving to the PRD because the PRI didn't give him the candidacy for governor of
Zacatecas, he was to state (I am citing the note by Ciro Pérez and Andrea Becerril in La Jornada, 1/7/98) that the Chenalhó
episode (referring to the Acteal massacre) was indeed
planned, "but not by the one stated by the white leader of the
dark-skinned indigenous," he opined that the EZLN's
position regarding the massacre had to do with "securing an preemptive
justification for Marcos and for those interests he is protecting," and he
finished by warning that the EZ serves foreign interests which seek "to
obtain control of the Isthmus of Tehuantepec region,
its resources and its strategic location, an objective which is suitably served
by Marcos and the armies which are fighting for the indigenous flag." Hmm...it sounds like, like...yes, Point 28 of AMLO's program which reads, verbatim: "We will link
the Pacific with the Atlantic, in the Isthmus of Tehuantepec,
through the construction of two commercial ports: one in Salina Cruz, Oaxaca,
and the other in Coatzacoalcos, Veracruz,
as well as container shipment railways and the widening of the existing
highway."
López Obrador has defined himself
with those individuals. He has added some, and, with them, he has subtracted,
among others, the "neozapatistas."
But, on another hand, why is
there nothing in that program about the political prisoners and disappeared in
the dirty war of the 70s and 80s? Nor about the punishment of former officials
who enriched themselves illicitly. Nor about serving justice in the cases of
the massacres of Acteal, El Bosque, Aguas Blancas, El Charco. I am afraid that, as to justice, López Obrador is offering
"wipe the slate clean and start anew," which, paradoxically, is not
new. Before returning to the criticisms of the statements the Sixth Declaration
of the Selva Lacandona
makes on
That we are going to come out
We are going to come out. We
are going to come out, and they had better get used to the idea. We are going
to come out, and I believe, there are only 4 ways of stopping us.
One is with a preventative
attack, so fashionable in this neoliberal period. The predictable steps are:
accusation of ties with drug trafficking or with organized crime in general; invocations
of the rule of law and rubbish to that effect; an intense media campaign; a
double attack (against the communities and against the General Command); damage
control (that is, distributing money, concessions and privileges among the
"spokespersons of public opinion"); the authorities call for calm; politicians
state that the most important thing is that the election takes place in peace
and with social tranquility; after a brief impasse, the candidates renew their
campaigns.
Another is taking us
prisoners the moment we come out, or during the course of the "other
campaign." The steps? Clandestine meetings among
the leaders of the PRI, PAN and PRD in order to make agreements (like in 2001,
with the indigenous counter-reform); the Cocopa states
that dialogue has broken off; the Congress votes to overturn the Law for
Dialogue; the PGR activates the arrest warrants; an AFI commando unit, with
help from the federal army, takes the Zapatista delegates prisoner; simultaneously
the federal army takes the rebel indigenous communities "in order to
prevent disorder and maintain the peace and national stability;" damage
control, etcetera.
Another is to kill us.
Stages: a hired assassin is contracted; a provocation is mounted; the crime is
committed; the authorities regret the incident and offer to investigate
"to its fullest extent, regardless of outcome...." Another alternative:
"a regrettable accident caused the death of the Zapatista delegation which
was on its way to blah, blah, blah." In both: damage control, etcetera.
Another is to disappear us. I am referring to a forced disappearance, as
was applied to hundreds of political opponents in the PRI "stability"
period. It could be like this: the Zapatista delegates don't appear; the last
time they were seen was blah, blah, blah; the authorities offer to investigate;
the hypothesis is ventured of a problem of passion; the authorities state that
they are investigating all leads, and they are not discarding the possibility
that the Zapatista delegation has taken advantage of their departure to flee,
with a quantity of bitter pozol, to a fiscal paradise; INTERPOL is investigating in
the Cayman Islands; damage control, etcetera.
These are the initial
problems which the Sixth could run up against. We have been preparing for many
years to confront those possibilities. That is why the Red Alert has not been
lifted for the insurgent troops, just for the towns. And that is why one of the
communiqués pointed out that the EZLN could lose, through jail, death or forced
disappearance, part or all of their publicly known leadership and continue
fighting.
I was speaking to you about
the critiques of the points made by the Sixth Declaration of the Selva Lacandona concerning
Concerning there's no place for you in this world
What happens, for example,
when, more than a decade ago, a little girl (let's say between 4 and 6 years
old), indigenous and Mexican, sees her father, her brothers, her uncles, her
cousins or her neighbors, taking up arms, a ton of pozol and a number of tostadas
and "going off to war?" What happens when some of them don't return?
What happens when that little
girl grows up, and, instead of going for firewood, she goes to school, and she
learns to read and write with the history of her people's struggle?
What happens when that girl
reaches youth, after 12 years of seeing, hearing and speaking with Mexicans,
Basques, North Americans, Italians, Spaniards, Catalans, French persons, Dutch,
German, Swiss, British, Finnish, Danish, Swedish, Greek, Russian, Japanese,
Australian, Filipino, Korean, Argentinean, Chilean, Canadian, Venezuelan,
Colombian, Ecuadorian, Guatemalan, Puerto Rican, Dominican, Uruguayan,
Brazilian, Cuban, Haitian, Nicaraguan, Honduran, Bolivian and etceteras, and
learns of what their countries, their struggles, their worlds are like?
What happens when she sees
those men and women sharing deprivations, work, anguish and joys with her
community?
What happens with that
girl-then-adolescent-then-young-woman after having seen and heard "the
civil societies" for 12 years, bringing not only projects, but also
histories and experiences from diverse parts of
What happens when she listens
to her brothers and sisters, to her parents, to her relatives, talking about
when they went to the March of the 1111 in 1997, to the Consulta of 5000 in 1999, when
they talk about what they saw and heard, about the families who welcomed them,
about what they are like as citizens, how they also are fighting, how they
won't give up either.
What happens when she sees,
for example, Eduardo Galeano, Pablo González Casanova, Adolfo Gilly,
Alain
What happens when, for
example, a girl grows up and reaches youth in the Zapatista resistance over 12
years in the mountains of the Mexican Southeast?
I'm asking because, for
example, there are two insurgentas
doing sentry duty here for the Red Alert in the EZLN headquarters. They are, as
the compas
say, "one hundred percent indigenous and one hundred percent
Mexican." One is 18 and the other 16. Or, in other words, in 1994, the one
was 6 and the other was 4. There are dozens like them in our mountain
positions, hundreds in the militias, thousands in organizational and community
positions, tens of thousands in the Zapatista communities. The immediate
commander of the two doing sentry duty is an insurgent lieutenant, indigenous,
22 years old, in other words, 10 years old in 1994. The position is under the
command of an insurgent captain, also indigenous, who,
as it should be, likes literature very much and is 24 years old, that is, 12 at
the beginning of the uprising. And there are men and women all over these lands
who passed from childhood to youth to maturity in the Zapatista resistance.
Then I ask: What am I saying
to you? That the world is wide and far away? That only what happens to us is
important? That what happens in other parts of Mexico, of Latin America and of
the world doesn't interest us, that we shouldn't involve ourselves in the
national or international, and that we should shut ourselves away (and deceive
ourselves), thinking that we can achieve, by ourselves, what our relatives died
for? That we shouldn't pay any attention to all the signs which are telling us
that the only was we can survive is by doing what we are going to do? That we
should refuse the listening and words of those who have never denied us either
one? That we should respect and help those same politicians who denied us a dignified
resolution of the war? That, before coming out, we have to pass a test in order
to see whether what we have constructed here over the last 12 years of war is
of sufficient merit?
We told you in the Sixth
Declaration that new generations have entered into the struggle. And they are
not only new, they also have other experiences, other
histories. We did not tell you in the Sixth, but I'm telling you now:
they are better than us, the ones who started the EZLN and began the uprising.
They see further, their step is more firm, they are more open, they are better
prepared, they are more intelligent, more determined, more aware.
What the Sixth presents is
not an "imported" product, written by a group of wise men in a
sterile laboratory and then introduced into a social group. The Sixth comes out
of what we are now and of where we are. That is why those first parts appeared,
because what we are proposing cannot be understood without understanding what our
experience and organization was before, that is, our history. And when I say
"our history" I am not speaking just of the EZLN, I am also including
all those men and women of
The Zapatista struggle is a
little hut, one more little house, perhaps the most humble and simplest among
those which are being raised, with identical or greater hardships and efforts,
in this street which is called "
A Penguin in the Selva Lacandona
Alright, a promise is a
promise. At the beginning of this document I told you I was going to tell you
about the penguin that's here, in the mountains of the Mexican Southeast, so
here goes.
It took place in one of the
insurgent barracks, a little more than a month ago, just before the Red
Alert. I was on my way, heading towards the position that was to be the
headquarters of the Comandancia General of the EZLN. I had to pick the insurgentes and insurgentas up
there, the ones who were going to make up my unit during the Red Alert. The
commander of the barracks, a Lieutenant Colonel Insurgente, was finishing up the
dismantling of the camp and was making arrangements for moving the impedimenta. In order to lighten the
burden of the support bases who were providing
supplies for the insurgent troops, the soldiers in this unit had developed a
few subsistence measures of their own: a vegetable garden and a farm. They
decided they would take as many of the vegetables as they could, and the rest
would be left to the hand of god. As for the chickens, hens and roosters, the
alternative was to eat them or leave them. "Better we eat them than the federales,"
the men and women (most of them young people under the age of 20) who were
maintaining that position decided, not without reason. One by one, the animals
ended up in the pot and, from there to the soldiers' soup dishes. There weren't
very many animals either, so in a few days the poultry population had been
reduced to two or three specimens.
When only one remained, on
the precise day of departure, what happened happened...
The last chicken began
walking upright, perhaps trying to be mistaken for one of us and to pass
unnoticed with that posture. I don't know much about zoology, but it does not
appear that the anatomical makeup of chickens is made for walking upright, so,
with the swaying produced by the effort of keeping itself upright, the chicken
was teetering back and forth, without being able to come up with a precise
course. It was then that someone said "it looks like a penguin." The
incident provoked laughter which resulted in sympathy. The chicken did, it's
true, look like a penguin, it was only missing the
white bib. The fact is that the jokes ended up preventing the
"penguin" from meeting the same fate as its compañeros from the farm.
The hour of departure
arrived, and, while checking to be sure nothing was left, they realized that
the "penguin" was still there, swaying from one side to another, but
not returning to its natural position. "Let's take it," I said, and
everyone looked at me to see if I were joking or serious. It was the insurgenta Toñita who offered to take it. It began raining, and she
put it in her lap, under the heavy plastic cape which Toñita
wore to protect her weapon and her rucksack from the water. We began the march
in the rain.
The penguin arrived at the
EZLN Headquarters and quickly adapted to the routines of the insurgent Red
Alert. It often joined (never losing the posture of a penguin) the insurgentes and insurgentas at
cell time, the hour of political study. The theme during those days was the 13 Zapatista
demands, and the compañeros
summed it up under the title "Why We Are Struggling." Well, you're
not going to believe me, but when I went to the cell meeting, under the pretext
of looking for hot coffee, I saw that it was the penguin who
was paying the most attention. And, also, from time to time, it would peck at
someone who was sleeping in the middle of the political talk, as if chiding him
to pay attention.
There are no other animals in
the barracks...I mean except for the snakes, the "chibo"
tarantulas, two field rats, the crickets, ants, an indeterminate (but very
large) number of mosquitoes and a cojolito who came to sing, probably because it felt called
by the music - cumbias,
rancheras, corridos, songs
of love, of spite - which emanated from the small radio which is used to hear
the morning news by Pascal Beltrán on Antena Radio and then "Plaza Pública" by Miguel Ángel Granados Chapa on Radio UNAM.
Well, I told you there
weren't any other animals, so it would seem normal that "penguin"
would think that we were its kind and tend to behave as if it were one more of
us. We hadn't realized how far it had gone until one afternoon when it refused
to eat in the corner it had been assigned, and it went over to the wooden
table. Penguin made a racket, more chicken-like than penguin-like, until we
understood that it wanted to eat with us. You should understand that Penguin's
new identity prevented the former chicken from flying the minimum necessary for
getting up on the bench, and so it was insurgenta Erika who lifted it up and let it eat from her
plate.
The insurgent captain in
charge had told me that the chicken, I mean penguin, did not like to be alone
at night, perhaps because it feared that the possums might confuse it with a
chicken, and it protested until someone took it to their tarp. It wasn't very
long before Erika and Toñita made it a white bib out
of fabric (they wanted to paint it [Penguin]with lime or house paint, but I
managed to dissuade them...I think), so that there would be no doubt that it
was a penguin, and no one would confuse it with a chicken.
You may be thinking that I
am, or we are, delirious, but what I'm telling you is true. Meanwhile, Penguin
has become part of the Comandancia General of the Ezeta,
and perhaps those of you who come to the preparatory meetings for the
"Other Campaign" might see it with your own eyes. It could also be
expected that Penguin might be the mascot for the EZLN football team when it
faces, soon, the
Do you know what? It occurs
to me now that we are like Penguin, trying very hard to be erect and to make
ourselves a place in
Vale. Salud and an embrace from Penguin (?)
From the mountains of the
Mexican Southeast
Subcomandante Insurgente Marcos