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Chiapas-Urgent, Resources for Indians
Dear friends, please distribute the following as you see best:
CHIAPAS--RESOURCES URGENTLY NEEDED IN INDIAN COMMUNITIES
A Personal Appraisal of the Current Political Climate and the Prospects for
Conservation and Sustainable Development in the Lacandon Rainforest
Ronald B. Nigh
April 28, 1996.- Much of the world, including much of Mexico, seems to be
under the impression that the conflict between the Zapatistas and Mexican
authorities is on the verge of being settled. Indeed this is the image that
has been projected by much of the Mexican press and actively sold abroad by
the Mexican diplomatic core, with its long experience as make-up artist for a
country with deep inequities and injustices. However, those of us who have
been close to the situation in Chiapas for many years see a very different
reality--never has the situation of the Zapatistas and the hundreds of
thousands of Indians and campesinos they, to a large extent, represent been
so desperate, never has the government shown a more intransigent and despotic
attitude to Indian demands and never have peace, democracy and prosperity for
the majority seemed so far from reach.
Three fundamental problems are contributing to the current instability:
1.-The Mexican government now openly scorns the negotiations underway with
Zapatista representatives. During the most recent talks, government
negotiators arrived in week-end clothes, refused to respond to Zapatista
questions or make any statements what-so-ever and read or engaged in other
activities (one government representative is reportedly studying Japanese at
the negotiation table) while Zapatista delegates spoke, in an attitude of
brazen disrespect and provocation.
2.-The presence of the army and the tactics of "low intensity warfare" (which
many observers claim are the calling cards of US military advisors) are
increasing in the Lacandon Rainforest and other areas where the Zapatista are
known to have social support. Intimidation and now, under the pretext of
looking for "marijuana plantations" direct intrusion of the army in areas of
restricted access under the negotiation terms.
3.-Funds for economic development that have been made available over the past
two years continue to spoon-fed only to those communities or cooperatives
that collaborate fully with the government, especially by joining the
PRI-controlled political organizations. Independent coops and especially
communities who expressed "Zapatista" leanings, (for example during the last
congressional elections) are left out in the cold--in some cases their
schools have even been closed down!
Of the strong-arm tactics used to pressure the Indians, the last point is
the most worrisome because it clearly indicates that the government has
refused to change fundamental attitudes directly responsible for the uprising
in the first place. Shortly after the end of the fighting in 1994, Epoca, a
national news weekly, published some revealing figures on agricultural
development in Chiapas during the previous years. They reported that even
before the Salinas administration years, Chiapas had been identified both by
international and federal agencies as a social time bomb. More and more
money was made progressively available to local authorities for economic
development. During the Salinas government, Chiapas was the major recipient
of funds allocated by the federal government for socioeconomic programs.
Epoca pointed out, however, that an analysis of the programs actually
carried out during those years reveals a curious paradox: Of the funds made
available for the different areas of agricultural development in Chiapas
during the Salinas administration only 15% were actually mobilized! The rest
stayed in the bank, not even to be robbed by corrupt officials or absorbed in
local bureaucracy. The reason for this failure to spend available funds is
that those funds were given out in the same manner mentioned above:
conditioned on full political cooperation with the government and its
official party the PRI. But times had changed; many Indians had become
disenchanted with official organizations and had formed their own coops,
trying to take direct control of their economic activities without the burden
of political tyranny. The local government (ultimately with federal backing)
refused to allow financial resources to reach the hands of these
independents. Seeing their economic freedom blocked, and facing increasing
direct repression from local state police and private gun-slingers, many
Indians decided that the Zapatistas were right--the only possibility was
armed rebellion.
This terror on the part of the local and federal governments of allowing
Indians control of their own economic development apparently continues to
obscure the political gaze. In 1995, the government began negotiations with
a group of over 30 independent Indian coops who had formed a coalition known
as the Democratic State Assembly of the People of Chiapas (AEDPCh in
Spanish). This organization represented, among others, most of the groups who
had occupied disputed lands since the uprising. Although they publicly
supported the Zapatista demands for political and social reforms, they risked
Zapatista disfavor to enter into direct talks with the federal government. In
fact, the Zapatista central committee at first criticized this decision but
later retracted to a more tolerant position. After months of hard work and
negotiation with the federal representative, the AEDPCh and its advisors
presented the government with a plan and asked for financial backing.
The plan involved an integral regional sustainable development project based
on a strategy of promoting selected export crops (such as organic coffee),
community-based ecotoursim and regional food security. It included a plan
for the indemnization of private claimants to Indian lands. This plan
clearly demonstrated that Indian organizations had the capacity to initiate a
creative, sustainable development process capable of generating local
employment, protecting the environment, fortifying and diversifying the state
economy and participating successfully in the global market. The response of
the government came like a bucket of ice water. Only a few isolated, low
priority projects were approved (for communities that had proved more pliable
to government wishes)--a package of barnyard animals here, a fruit tree
nursery there, a pig feedlot elsewhere. The major integrative projects, that
would have given economic coherence to the whole and allowed the Indian
organization to operate as a kind of "incubator" of locally-owned businesses
were not approved. The AEDPCh called the response an "insult" and refused to
continue discussions, publicly recognizing that the Zapatistas had been
correct in their criticism.
With this experience it became clear that the government would under no
circumstances loosen its iron grip on the absolute political control of all
development processes, which is the principle factor currently holding back
the economic progress of the region. To date, such funds as have been
released have been given to fully official organizations such as the
so-called "ARIC oficial". Independent coops or communities are denied any
kind of aid and troops are usually located near them. Individuals are
approached by "ARIC oficial" members and offered sums to switch their
allegiance to the official organization, a situation that has provoked
considerable conflict within the communities as the economic situation
becomes more desperate and the military's low level pressure inches up.
Sadly, there are, at present, few alternatives for the independent
organizations. The talks with the Zapatistas are stalled and seem unlikely to
provide an alternative mechanism for economic support of development and the
training and technical assistance it requires. The actions of non-government
organizations have in large part been blocked by government action as well.
In a recent press release the "ARIC oficial" announced it would request that
"foreign" NGOs be expelled from the region for causing "divisions in the
communities". (It's a long standing PRI tactic to accuse the opposition of
what the PRI is in fact doing!) Naturally, "foreign" NGOs (really Mexican
NGOs who have managed to garner very scarce foreign resources, principally
>from Europe) not only serve as witnesses to government pressure tactics but
theoretically could offer an alternative to the government monopoly on
development resources.
The international financial agencies, despite noble declarations to the
contrary, seem to be no more sensitive to the situation nor interested in
fostering locally controlled, democratic economic development. The infamous
International Finance Corporation of the World Bank recently announced
investments in Chiapas. Yet even a superficial look at the projects proposed
induce a sense of nausea. The Fondo Chiapas, which the IFC says it will now
support, will promote plantations of rubber, oil palm, and bamboo in the rain
forest. It's hard to believe, even considering that the IFC is the private
sector wing of the World Bank, that anyone could be seriously discussing
these projects for Chiapas, given the social and political situation and the
urgent need to find development patterns that conserve the incredible
biological treasures of the Selva Lacandona. Crops like rubber occupy prime
forest lands; Indians would go into debt to become, essentially, workers in
an agroindustry in which their sole function would be to provide a cheap raw
material to the corporations who would receive all the value added. Schemes
like these conjure up visions of a future Lacandon Rainforest converted into
a dismal concentration camp, tended by the army, where jungle has been
replaced by monoculture plantations and free men and women have become
prisoners of yet another system to remove their resources and wealth and
leave them at the lowest rungs of society.
These projects also demonstrate a myopic vision of Mexico's problems that
seems to be quite generalized in official circles. Since entering into NAFTA
and GATT, Mexico's food production has plummeted. The country now spends the
dollar equivalent of its total petroleum exports on the importation of food,
even such basic staples as corn. Mexico contemplates importing as much as
9,000,000 tons of corn, mostly from the US, during 1996. This is 75% of its
historic levels of annual production in recent years. Yet Sparks Commodities
recently announced that US corn reserves are at a 50 year low and that the
Clinton administration may be forced to embargo US grain exports later this
year. Is no one in the Mexican government or in the World Bank asking
themselves how Mexico will feed itself in the near future if these
predictions pan out? Has it occurred to no one that the millions of Indians
and peasant who still farm the land, is spite of years of official
abandonment, repression and scorn, could be part of the solution?
It is urgent that the Indian businesses and communities of Chiapas,
independently of their political affliliations, have access to financial
resources, receive sympathetic training and technical assistance and be
empowered to take the development of their homeland into their own hands. It
is the only way the resources of the tropical rain forest can be preserved
and it is the only hope for peace, prosperity and democracy in the region.