Nov. 10—Over a hundred people gathered outside the Mexican Consulate at Philadelphia’s 5th and Market Streets holding candles and cardboard crosses bearing the names of the 43 student activists from a teachers’ college in rural Mexico “disappeared” on their way to a protest earlier last month.
Part vigil, part militant protest, the gathering was a strong demonstration of force and compassion by leaders in the city’s Mexican-American community who rallied against the forces of repression both in Mexico as well as here in the United States.
They crowd encircled a banner reading: “It Was the State. There are Thousands of [the] 43!” and chanted, “La reprecíon no tiene fronteras!” The ongoing search and investigation for the missing students has uncovered numerous mass graves holding dozens of bodies, none of which have been successfully identified. Over the past weeks, the governor of Guerrero resigned, the former mayor of Iguala was arrested, and the Presidential Palace burned.
A movement has been growing in Mexico demanding justice for the Ayotzinapa 43, and continuous protests have inspired solidarity actions worldwide.
Jesus Guttierez, an activist with Dream Act Pennsylvania and one of the organizers of the action in Philadelphia, said that activists in the United States should protest not only the corruption in Mexico but also the U.S. government’s relationship to the repressive government there.
Oil is among the many profit areas for U.S. corporations in Mexico, and the U.S. government maintains an exploitative free-trade agreement known as NAFTA, which enables an elite business class to reap massive profits while masses of people are forced into extreme poverty.
Guttierez mentions that Mexican President Peña Nieto just acquired a $7 million house while people there go hungry and sleep in the streets. Like the Ayotzinapa 43 on their way to the protest, Guttierez and everyone standing in solidarity in Philadelphia and around the world want justice, and then peace.
“The protests won’t stop until the students are returned safe and Peña Nieto resigns,” he said, “but really a new president is not going to solve anything. We need a new system.
