On Oaxaca

Last night I went to see a documentary about Oaxaca. The crowd was mostly gringo middle class, but I noticed some native, a few latino and a couple of blacks. The film was mostly accurate except by the end, when they try to be optimist about the current situation in Oaxaca. Un Poquito de Tanta Verdad (“A Little bit of so much truth”) puts emphasis on the role of the media during the events from May through December 2006, when the people of Oaxaca struggled for some justice until being brutally repressed.

Oaxaca is located in the south of Mexico, where most of the indigenous population is concentrated. As a consequence of their oppression, Oaxaca is also one of the poorest states in the country, with an illiteracy rate that has risen over the past 10 years and is close to 20%. The largest industry in the area is agriculture, but tourism has also economic importance, which is why the events of 2006 have not only caused a huge social shock, but also considerable harm to the local economy. In May 2006 a strike by the school teachers began, it was the Local 22 of the SNTE (the teacher’s union, one of the biggest of Latin America). Teachers, in addition to their demand of a rise on their salaries and better working environment were asking for better conditions for students as well, especially in the nutritional aspect, pointing at changes in state policies to improve the conditions of life of the general population. With their demands being unattended, the teachers decided to take the main square of the city (Zocalo) and stayed there for several days. In June, the local government, under the leadership of Governor Ulises Ruiz Ortiz (URO), sent the state police to repress the strikers. Early in the morning of June 14th, using their characteristic violent techniques, the police began to evict and arrest striking teachers stationed in the Zocalo. Contrary to the state expectations, this followed growing popular support, other organizations endorsed the struggle of teachers and the APPO (Popular Assembly of the People of Oaxaca), a group that already had a cell for some years, is founded. By the end of the month, around 300 thousand people took the streets demanding URO’s resignation. The popular movement kept growing, they took radios and even a TV channel for 3 weeks. The APPO denied the authority of URO and barricades are built throughout the capital city. In September, around 3 000 teachers, peasants, students among others, go walking to Mexico City to ask the government for the destitution of URO. By October the army starts arriving to Oaxaca. In November, President Fox sent the PFP (Preventive Federal Police), violence raises, many people disappears, over a hundred are killed, women are tortured and raped. By December some teachers go back to schools, divisions within the labor bureaucracy end up in deals with the government and betrayal for most of the fighting teachers. The Oaxaca I found by the end of the year was full of military and PFP, they were still in charge and arresting teachers and leaders of the APPO. A year later, just a couple of weeks ago, there was a march on the streets of Oaxaca, called by the APPO, just around a hundred people went out.

Once again the people united have been defeated. For me, two are the main lessons of the Oaxaca insurrection: (1) The struggle is a class struggle; and (2) Without a program, a firm direction, the road is blurry and uncertain.

Capitalism has created two irreconcilable social classes: the bourgeoisie, who owns and controls the means of production; and the proletariat, who has to sell its labour power to survive. The interests of one class are opposed to the interests of the other one. Capitalism was progressive, it improved technology, it has socialized production, etc. Imperialism, the highest state of capitalism, creates severe inequality, indiscriminate exploitation of raw materials, colonization of semi-industrial countries, and so on. The proletariat has the power to affect directly the levels of the economy, it can stop production, it has the social power to overcome and defeat their exploiters, but what is missing is the consciousness. That is what happened in Oaxaca, the Local 22 was fighting for justice, when the APPO got popular support instead of appealing to the rest of the oppressed in Mexico, the leaders of the insurrection asked the federal government for the deposition of a governor and his substitution with a “better” one. The state was not “suffering” the monopoly of the PRI (a party that has ruled Oaxaca for decades), nor other bourgeois party will be much better. In order to really achieve a just society where we produce for human progress and not for profits we have to start thinking in terms of class struggle and take a side: barbarism or socialism. In that sense, we need to organize by ourselves, the independence of class is most important, appealing to the capitalist or its state, the machinery formed by the government elite, the congress, jails, army and cops, always end with betrayal and more oppression, this has been proved by history at the expense of activists blood time and time again. In the case of Oaxaca, appealing to the Fox administration (PAN) or to the other strong bourgeois party, the PRD, proved to be a huge mistake. At the same time, building ties with the state through the treachery labour leadership (Local 22 leader Rueda Pacheco), could only develop in defeat.

There is an urgent necessity to forge revolutionary leaderships that have the understanding of the historical and political experiences. It is very important that this vanguard has an internationalist and proletarian program, and fights for it even in peaceful or reactionary times, building some consciousness among the workers. The outcome of Oaxaca would have been completely different, even a revolutionary opportunity could have been created, if the leadership was based on a revolutionary program. They would have pushed the SNTE as a whole, in every corner of the Mexican territory, call for the other unions to join them, and keep the media on that program instead of creating illusions in the same politicians, the state or reforms that always end up in the same.

We need more October revolutions, is true, but they won’t come unless we start working on a revolutionary program and a leadership who understands society as class divided and the need to get rid of capitalism. Any revolutionary opportunity, which very rarely occur -even less in times like now-, would end up wasted unless we understand those basic principles. History would repeat itself until we learn from it.

More info on the film: http://www.corrugate.org/un_poquito_de_tanta_verdad/un_poquito_de_tanta_verdad