In memory of José Enrique Espinoza Juárez

Strictly speaking, the Plan Puebla Panama (PPP) has nothing to do with the conflict that arose after the expropriation of 5,000 hectares (15,000 acres) of farmland northeast of Mexico City on October 22, 2001, for the construction of a new airport.  Geographically, at least, the expropriated lands in the dry lakebed of Texcoco in the state of Mexico are outside of what the Mexican government has designated as the PPP zone.  However, studying the “Atenco conflict”, as it was named after one of the most combative municipalities in Texcoco, can be beneficial to the anti-PPP movement in eight countries.

There certainly are similarities.  The airport in Texcoco was to be the most ambitious “megaproject” of Vicente Fox’s administration, similar to the infrastructure construction on the drawing board for the PPP’s 28 megaprojects. Just as the expropriation of lands in Texcoco was done without government consultation of the small landowners, there is also a lack of information on PPP projects, particularly regarding details such as the location of roads, high-voltage electrical lines, hydroelectric dams, and other data.

The reasons for this lack of information are obvious.  On the one hand it is well known that there is always intense trafficking of insider information and influences in government corridors before any official announcements, in order to speculate with the buying and selling of land near project sites.  But the main reason for secrecy is to prevent people from organizing efficiently.  Far from providing precise and complete information to the general public, particularly to the communities most affected by projects, as the Fox administration has promised with the PPP, the intention of withholding information is to catch everyone off guard.  Instead of a healthy, democratic exercise that would allow citizens to find out the facts ahead of time, and thus articulate opinions backed by data, draw up proposals and alternatives, and organize to defend their interests, the tactic, both in the Fox administration and in previous  PRI (Institutional Revolutionary Party) governments, is to strike while the iron is hot, and, in the muddle, head off any attempts to organize and resist.

This time in Atenco the story ended differently.  With machetes in hand, the ejidatarios (communal landholders) took to the streets to protect their most precious possession, their lands, the same day, in fact hours after, the official announcement of the expropriation of their lands.

There are many lessons to be learned from Atenco that may be useful for the PPP resistance struggle.  The main lesson is that is it possible to stop the advance of governmental megaprojects, that would seek to dispossess the campesinos (peasants) of their lands and natural resources for the benefit for a few corporations and persons.

It may well be that Mexico City needs to expand its airport facilities.  But what must now be relegated to history is the government’s way of proceeding, in collusion with large corporation and investment capital, behind the people’s backs.  The custom of robbing campesinos’ patrimony, in order to undertake big-time business deals, must now be tossed into the rubbish heap.  If large airport facilities are needed, or other megaprojects required, they will have to be carried out with the public’s approval, and especially with the approval of those most directly affected.  That’s the way it has to be as the country becomes more democratic.

If the government does not begin to change its attitude, through transparency, openness, dialogue (real, not simulated), then there will be one, two, many Atencos throughout the PPP area.  People’s awareness is growing, in spite of limitations, and they are organizing in order to resist.  Development must take into account the interests of the majority, or else it’s not development.

We can only wish for a change in the attitude of the powerful.  But we saw an example in Atenco.  The conflict began on October 22, 2001, and the federal government agreed to a dialogue with the ejidatarios on July 19, 2002, nine months (!) afterwards, and even then there was official foot dragging.  No wonder machetes were brandished.

Clearly, the expropriation decree was revoked, and the ejidatarios’ wishes were respected only because the government had no other option.  The Texcoco campesinos were committed the struggle regardless of the consequences, and the raised machete symbolized their conviction.

But we must not delude ourselves.  There has been no fundamental change or a new willingness to dialogue on the part of the powerful after Atenco.  Fox said it bluntly regarding his mandate, “my government is of entrepreneurs, for entrepreneurs”, and we can expect him to act in accordance, defending certain interests.  Where there is no opposition, rights will be trampled.  Because it’s clear that certain elite groups were very displeased with the decision to cancel the airport in Texcoco.  The most unfortunate and cynical declaration in this regard came from Ecatepec bishop Onésimo Cepeda (“even if 500 were killed”, the airport should have been built in Texcoco), but the remark clearly reflects the attitude of certain economically powerful, but minority, groups.

For big business interests in particular, Atenco was a test for Fox in managing the most serious social conflict of his administration.  But declarations from most of the business chambers in Mexico show that Fox failed miserably (1).  In addition, the US press has reflected the malaise with Fox among economically powerful interest there. Oh, true, it’s all well and good, this talk of more democracy, but Fox is where he is because he is expected to defend a certain economic line.  His task is to maintain this line, period.  The US press has called Fox “ineffectual” for this reason. (2)   Powerful economic interests in the US don’t want to see a “champion of democracy” in Mexico, but a leader who is “ineffectual” when it comes to assuring certain interests.  There is no desire to see another Francisco I. Madero in the presidency in Mexico.(3)  And should that ever happen, there are historical and modern precedents for predicting what might follow.

Convinced as we are that things have not changed fundamentally and, with PPP megaprojects at hand, rights and communal property will have to be defended as they were in Atenco, it is worthwhile to review why Atenco was a grassroots success story.  There are lessons therein for future struggles.

For this purpose CIEPAC has put together a chronology of the Atenco conflict by following the story in the press (principally La Jornada) during the nine months it lasted.  Although a chronology isn’t the complete story, it is a useful initial overview, and the only one possible given our location in Chiapas, 1,000 km. from the scene of the action.  The chronology is available (in Spanish only) to our readers at

http://www.ciepac.org/otras%20temas/atenco/index%20%20atenco.htm together with other related documents.

What conclusions can be made from the chronology of the Atenco movements and what lessons does it offer?

From the start the majority of the ejidatarios were clear that they would never surrender their most valuable asset, their land.  Even though the government’s offer of US$0.70 per square meter was absurd, and a political stupidity, the problem wasn’t the amount of money.  It was a question of a way of life, a way of being, a desire to continue being rural producers of basic foods.  In this sense the Texcoco ejidatarios are similar to the peasants from the state of Morelos who joined Emiliano Zapata 92 years ago to fight the Mexican Revolution.  American historian John Womack Jr. has written that these first Zapatistas were, “country people who did not want to move and therefore got into a revolution. They did not figure on so odd a fate. Come hell, high water, agitators from the outside, or reports of green pastures elsewhere, they insisted only on staying in the villages and little towns where they had grown up, and where before them their ancestors for hundreds of years had lived and died” (4)

The Mexico City daily La Jornada published a modern vignette from Texcoco, captured in the midst of celebrations following the reversal of the expropriation decree:

“One of the men who made this victory possible is Francisco Morales.  Bundled in his hole-riddled Chiconcuac sweater, this campesino defied the early-morning cold to participate in the victory celebration.  He doesn’t see himself as a social activist, just a man with roots.  “I am an ejidatario from La Magdalena.  I’m 75 years old and I’ve worked my plot for 50 years, since my father passed away.  Our people have preferred a handful of earth to a wad of bills.  The bills disappear (but) we will have our lands forever.  The land is our life.  It allows us to look people in the eye, as equals” (5)

Francisco Morales’ conviction and clarity also found expression among the Texcoco edidatarios who said over and again that they were willing to face everything, even death if necessary, in order to maintain control of their land.  The machete became the movement’s emblem and defiance, a declaration of willingness to defend a way of being, by taking up arms if an agreement through dialogue failed.

Apart from this political clarity, Texcoco residents reacted immediately to the presidential decree.  The same day the expropriation was announced, the ejidatarios mobilized and blocked the Texcoco-Lechería highway as a sign of protest, an act that would be repeated often in the coming months.

There were also grassroots actions of self defense from the very start.  These were aimed at protecting territory, an explicit declaration that the land belongs to those who work it, and a first announcement, through action, of a fledgling autonomy, which would be formally enacted months later.  Young men on bicycles organized sentries’ rounds of communal properties; trenches were dug to prevent heavy machinery from entering and to make it harder for security forces to penetrate.  Barricades were constructed from rocks, tires, sand-filled sacks.  Tents were raised in the fields to protect crops and wells during the night.

Trespassers were dealt with by community justice.  Throughout the nine-month struggle, people, both foreign and nationals, and vehicles, were detained when they invaded communal lands without permission.  This list of detainees includes federal officials who “were lurking about”, six topographers from the company Sistemas Avanzados y Proyectos, nine PRI members who were handing out food parcels and taking photos, three workers from Geo Sol, S.A. who undertook “soil mechanic studies”, and two foreign academics who shot a video without permission, among others.

Solidarity also played an important role.  A wide spectrum of organizations in Mexico showed their faith in the just cause of the ejidatarios: the Congreso Nacional Indígena, Frente Popular Francisco Villa, CLETA, FZLN, CNTE, townspeople of Papalotla, Euzkadi workers, Escuela Normal el Mexe, SITUAM, 200 campesinos from Guerrero, UCEZ, 300 professors from section 18 of SNTE de Michoacán y del Valle de México, 17 rural teachers schools within the Federación de Estudiantes Campesinos Socialistas, social, neighborhood and students organizations, from Veracruz, Oaxaca, Chiapas, Tlaxcala, Puebla and other states, academics from UA-Chapingo, Colegio de Posgraduados, the Olga Isabel autonomous municipality in Chiapas, MPI, Movimiento Ciudadano de Cholula, Asociación Cívica Comunitaria de Insurgencia Popular, and many others. 

There was other support, from the 18 US students who marched with the ejidatarios on May 1^st and were expelled by the Mexican migra, to cultural solidarity from Mexican artists, and French artists as well, who coordinated simultaneous demonstrations in Toulouse.  As the months passed, solidarity throughout the world grew to support this cause.  In this country all opinion polls showed that the majority of Mexicans supported the struggle.

In addition to the solidarity that spontaneously arose, the Atenco movement also wisely knew how to take the initiative and search proactively for solidarity.  The ejidatarios marched to the National Pedagogic University, the National University’s College of Economics, to FES-Zaragoza, the Chamber of Deputies, and they went to Chiapas to seek the support of the EZLN.  They took their struggle to the gated embassies of Germany, Spain and France.  They participated in Jalisco in a strike with Euzkadi workers and were detained with them.  They held the “First National Campesino Encounter” on their lands, hosting 93 organizations.  They joined forces with the Emiliano Zapata Campesino Union of Puebla to protest against the state government’s  Millenium Plan, a part of the Puebla Panama Plan.  In another political action, the ejidatarios demanded freedom for Erica Zamora, jailed for alleged links to an armed group.  They marched on a Korean maquiladora located near their lands and protested against the unjust conditions under which their daughters and sons work.

In sum, the Atenco conflict went far beyond the struggle over communal lands.  The ejidatarios were able to relate their particular problems with the overarching situation that prevails: impunity, a lack of justice and democracy, and the dogged attempt of the rich and powerful to plunder what is of the people.  The peasants of Texcoco easily make links between their struggle and the protests being undertaken throughout Mesoamerica against the PPP and the FTAA (Free Trade Agreement of the Americas).

In addition to the political struggle, the ejidatarios did not overlook the legal fight.  Although there were initially disagreements regarding the emphasis to give legal aspects, the injustice of the expropriation order was blatant enough for judges to grant injunctions.  The injunctions, together with the Supreme Court’s decision to hear the case, prevented the government from proceeding legally to execute the decree, thus permitting time to work in favor of the Texcoco peasants.

There were additional factors that we have not mentioned here.  The repression, for example, that the campesinos experienced and which sadly led to the death of José Enrique Espinoza Juárez, an ejidatario.  The rectitude of the ejidatarios in the face of death threats, of the threat of invasion by the army, of repression in a variety of forms, the brutality of the police during the marches, and the perennial attempts of the government to buy off, co-opt, corrupt.

The history of the Atenco movement is rich in experiences and lessons.  We invite our readers to explore this event through the following documents that are available on CIEPAC’s website: 

·         a chronology
·         a systematization (ordering) of the specific events
·         the electronic news clippings over nine months (mostly from La Jornada)
·         Juan Castro’s analysis on the subject

Footnotes:

(1) See El Universal, August 3, 2002, “Desilusiona a IP fallo de Texcoco” by Gudadalupe Hernández, p.1.

(2) See, for example the New York Times, August 3, 2002, in an article by Ginger Thompson, “Mexico Drops Planned Airport After Protests From Peasants”, which states, “The decision...was viewed by some political and business leaders as a significant defeat for Mr. Fox and the most glaring example of his administration's inability to deliver promised projects and reforms.”

(3) Francisco I. Madero was Mexico’s 1^st president after the 1910 revolutionary uprising brought an end to a 35-year-old dictatorship.  Democratic to a fault, Madero was unable to reconcile conflicting economic and political interests and was assassinated in 1912. US ambassador to Mexico at the time, Henry Lane Wilson, was a co-conspirator in the plot to murder Madero (Krauze, Enrique, “Francisco I. Madero: Místico de la libertad”, Fondo de Cultura Económica, Mexico City, 1987, p.97). “The ambassador encouraged Huerta to overthrow Madero and told him that the United States would recognize a government arising out of such a coup” (Katz, Friedrich, “The Life and Times of Pancho Villa”, Stanford University Press, California, 1998, p.195)

(4) John Womack, Jr.  “Zapata and the Mexican Revolution” (Original in English published in 1969), Alfred A. Knopf, Inc. and Random House, Inc., 1969, p. ix.

(5) María Rivera, correspondent, “Aún hay reticencias entre ejidatarios para echar campanas al vuelo; quieren certezas”, La Jornada, August 3, 2002.

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