On 12 October, Zapatista support-bases, forcibly displaced on 9 September by what the Good-Government Council (JBG) of Oventic referred to in September as “death-threats and aggressions [carried out by] people from political parties in the ejido,” returned to their community of origin, San Marcos Avilés, municipality of Chilón. The return was accompanied by a commission of support-bases from the Zapatista Army for National Liberation (EZLN) hailing from municipalities close to San Marcos Avilés.
The communiqué, released from Oventic on 13 October, explains that “our comrades now are back in their humble abodes, though pillaged and some even semi-destroyed by the aggressors. Our support-bases will be there because our comrades have hte right to live in their community and work their lands; they will not bother anyone: they only want to live in their community and work to survive, as they won’t be requesting welfare from the bad government. Our comrades will live and eat from their own work and sweat […]. If something happens to our comrades that are now there in the community, those responsible will be the municipal, state, and federal governments that advise, finance, and arm paramilitary groups and manipulate the impoverished. We Zapatistas bother no one: we do not evict our brothers from political parties, we do not persecute anyone, we do not loot the lands of our peasant brothers or any other poor brother. We only defend what is ours, which is our rights: we live and eat from our proper work and sweat, but we also want ot struggle for true democracy, liberty, and justice for all. These are our crimes as Zapatistas […]. The autonomy of peoples is not something that is wanted by the mad governments, because they want to continue having under their control indigenous communities; they are frustrated when we indigenous peoples learn how to organize and govern our own selves. In any case, the struggle we today carry out cannot be detained by no one.”
For more information (in Spanish):
Zapatista support-bases return to San Marcos Avilés following a month of being displaced (La Jornada, 14 October 2010)
Communiqué of the Oventic JBG: The Oventic JBG reports on the situation of the displaced support-bases and denounces the repression of the bad government (13 October 2010)
For more information from SIPAZ (in English):
Chiapas: Denunciation of the Oventic JBG regarding violent expulsion of Zapatista support-bases in San Marcos y Pamala (14 September 2010)
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