Gloria Muñoz Ramírez
photo: Solidarity Brigade
La Jornada
Saturday June 4, 2016
Saturday June 4, 2016
They are in the right and the State is afraid. The rejection by
the National Coordinator of Educational Workers (CNTE) teachers union of the labor
reform being disguised by the government under the title of educational reform,
is in the streets.
The mass mobilization this Friday June 3 showed the health
of a movement growing despite an aggressive smear campaign. In desperation, the
government strategy that has renounced dialogue and opted for threats and
beatings led to a dramatic, televised humiliation of PRI teachers who were
fleeced and forced to walk barefoot through the streets of Comitan, Chiapas, an
action which was blamed on the National Coordinator of Educational Workers (CTNE)
union teachers. The fact that some of the victims have exposed the report,
denying the the blaming of CNTE members
for the act, has only strengthened the movement and its demands. It was not members
of the CNTE who committed act, the perpetrators were agents of the Institutional
Revolutionary Party PRI in power and its allies.
Even if you do not agree with the demands of magistrates,
teachers should have the right to walk and march through the streets of Mexico
City and any other entity; to protest and to demonstrate just as in any
democratic state. But apparently not in Mexico, where they are treated as
dangerous criminals who must be encapsulated by massive police contingents to
prevent their free movement. On Friday the Federal Police boarded public buses,
swarmed the Metro, and took literally command of the city, in an operation in accomplice
with Mancera police.
Yet in spite of the tactics of government suppression, the
teachers were received as “distinguished visitors”, so they were named by the rector
of the UACM, Hugo Aboites, and so the should be received by the general population
for which whose public education services the CNTE is struggling. That is why
the University Council of the UACM, without any ambiguity, received the CNTE with
the greatest honors. We are doing what we should and must do: manifesting that
the university perform in favor of betterment of social causes, said the
rector.
The threats and harassment by media hacks in service to the government, are playing
in favor of the cause of the teachers. Until a few weeks ago one might think
that the CNTE did not have public support, but in recent mass mobilizations the
common people have taken to the streets to demonstrate their support. It is the
ordinary people, but also organizations, which are filling the streets. They
are the San Quintin day laborers; the parents of Ayotzinapa normalistas; the
Mexican Electricians Union; students of UNAM, of the Poli, of the UAM and the UACM,
and the Zapatista Army of National Liberation, among many others, who are
openly supporting the teachers demands.
The so called legislative “reform” is causing a catastrophe
in the education system so that families tend to work overtime to be able to
send their children to private schools; or settle for that a lifestyle for
their children as constant consumers of television, radio and digital media; or
on the street, or even worse than that, as warned the Zapatistas.
The teachers wave of insurgency is on the rise. The CNTE
insists on its willingness to dialogue, while the government sent thousands of
police to corral them like cattle, which does nothing but fan the flame of
indignation.
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