Hidden behind the headlines about the disputed July 2 Mexican presidential election is the unfolding situation in the state of Oaxaca. This increasingly pitched struggle holds great importance for the entire Mexican working class.
The current face-off between the people and the repressive state apparatus began on June 14 when members of the
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State authorities and business owners have complained because the struggle has “negatively impacted tourism” and imposed a “sense of lawlessness” to the region. While tourism is down by 75 percent this season, the strikers and their supporters are not at fault. The ruling class is using these arguments in an attempt to mask the reality they face—they are up against a mass mobilization of the Oaxacan people.
Likewise, the local bourgeoisie has blamed the cancellation of the popular Guelaguetza dance festival on social unrest. The corporate media says protesters oppose the event. What they fail to report, however, is that many scheduled performers are boycotting the festival in solidarity with the striking teachers and the growing movement.
The broad nature of this rebellion in Oaxaca is becoming clearer everyday. It is about much more than a teachers’ strike. Rossana Fuentes-Berain, a political analyst at the Autonomous Technological Institute of Mexico told the Christian Science Monitor, “In the case of Oaxaca, what we are seeing now is something that has been boiling for decades. It is emblematic of frustrations people feel in parts of the country.”
Whole townships have been taken over by workers, peasants and Indigenous people tired of the oppressive conditions brought on by neoliberal policies and capitalist corruption.
People’s organizations formed
In Oaxaca’s capital city, a coalition of trade unionists, revolutionary Marxists and progressives formed the Popular Assembly of Oaxaca (APPO) in June 2006.
The newly constituted APPO is demanding the ouster of Oaxaca’s governor, Ulises Ruiz Ortiz of the Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI). It has also declared the state government void.
The APPO recently sent delegates to Mexico City to emphasize that it now holds the state government. A caravan left Oaxaca on July 25 for the national capital to demand attention to the petition for the governor’s impeachment in the national senate.
The APPO’s political demands were backed up with militant action in Oaxaca as they blockaded and occupied government buildings of the legislative, judicial and executive offices on July 26.
Many other towns in Oaxaca also have been taken over by workers. An estimated 24 municipal seats of government have been taken over by popular forces. In San Juan Bautista Tuxtepec, teachers occupied the government building, while in the town of Santa Cruz Xoxocotlan, the people formed a general assembly. On Aug. 1, more than 500 women blockaded a state-run television station in Oaxaca. They demanded to broadcast a live message calling for the governor’s immediate resignation.
The movement has not been without its setbacks, and the state is still willing to resort to repressive measures to suppress it. This was shown by a paramilitary attack on a university radio station on July 22. There have also been vicious attacks on local Indigenous leaders as well as on trade unionists. But police are nowhere to be seen in many cities and towns in Oaxaca. This is no doubt due to the strength of the people’s movement.
The July 2 national elections threw out much of the old PRI-affiliated political class that had governed Oaxaca for decades, replacing them with representatives of the Party of the Democratic Revolution (PRD)—the party helmed by presidential candidate Andrés Manuel López Obrador. But the liberal PRD hasn’t been supportive of the people’s movement so far.
Despite the lack of institutional support, the APPO has pushed forward, becoming increasingly independent of the established capitalist political parties.
The revolutionary potential of the situation in Oaxaca is becoming clearer each day. Workers, students and farmers are beginning to realize the power of unity as the uprising spreads to more towns and sections of the population. The struggle also has drawn workers from all over Mexico, including activists from San Salvador Atenco, where police and government troops brutally suppressed demonstrations in May.
APPO activists say that their goals stretch beyond the confines of Oaxaca. Florentino Lopez Martinez, a member of the APPO says the struggle could become a national fight against neoliberalism: “We are against repression, and we could provide unity for all the country, where the pueblo is fighting against the rich.”
