Felipe Carrillo Puerto, Quintana Roo,
Mexico
April 30, 2021.
Carta abierta al presidente de México,
Andrés Manuel López Obrador
I am writing to you to express my feelings regarding the event in which you will ask for forgiveness, on behalf of the Mexican government, for the grievances suffered by the Mayan people during the War of the Castes, and according to you, to also commemorate the end of said war 120 years ago.
I would have liked to deliver this message personally, but I find out that this activity will be conducted behind closed doors at the museum of Tihosuco. Why not have it done in a Mayan Masewal ceremonial center?
I indicate to you now that there is an inaccuracy, or a possible deliberate intention perhaps by your advisers, when presenting the ordering of concepts and errors in dates.
The site that has been chosen to hold the event was a colonial city and not the place where the war against the Maya began; it began in Tepich, a neighboring town.
The great Mayan uprising, known as the War of the Castes, began in July 1847, that is, 174 years ago and there was never an armistice or an effective peace agreement.
Every year on May 3, the Masewal Mayan villages and ceremonial centers celebrate the traditional ceremony of the Holy Cross. May 3, 1901 did not mark the end of the war, nor did the Mayans flee to the jungle before the Mexican army's invasion of Noj Kaaj Santa Cruz , now called Carrillo Puerto. The Maya had already abandoned the location in order to continue their resistance from the jungle.
The last recorded and documented confrontations between the Mayas and the Mexican army occurred in April 1933 in Dzulá and 1979 in Chemax. The root causes that detonated these confrontations were essentially the same ones that motivated the Mayan uprising in 1847: Invasion and attempted dispossession of the territory of the Mayan people who defended themselves and tried to stop these attacks by foreigners who were supported by the military and public security forces.
Hence, it is incomprehensible that you have made the executive decision that
the last sections of the train that will pass through Mayan territory are to be
built by the federal army, which will then administer it as well as the airport
that will be constructed in Tulum. The profits obtained with these operations
will also be destined for the benefit of the army, and all this to occur
without any compensation or material consideration for the damages suffered by
the Mayan people during the conquest, colonization and the War of the Castes.
I must tell you, Mr. President, that the memories of the war in question are still present in the memory of our Mayan Masewal grandparents and grandmothers, they did not forget the persecution and extermination they suffered. It was the waches, soldiers of the Mexican army, who attacked us under the orders of cruel military leaders among which is counted the jackal Victoriano Huerta.
By directing these lines to you, it inevitably comes to mind that between 1992 and 2016, three heads of the Vatican have asked forgiveness in different countries for the sins committed against the original peoples, including the Maya of the Peninsula, during the epochs of the colonial invasion, conquest and evangelization. Despite this, the indoctrinations of the Catholic Church as well as other Christian churches, continue still now today without respect for the indigenous worldview and our traditional spirituality.
You have asked the Spanish government and the head of the Vatican to "apologize for the abuses, crimes and outrages against the native peoples", on the occasion that this year will be the 500th anniversary of the conquest of the ancient Tenochtitlan, but you have not yet obtained the answer you want. These requests for forgiveness addressed to those who still owe a huge historical debt to the Indigenous Peoples have been useless or of no real effect.
By coming here to ask for forgiveness as a representative of the federal government, you also assume the responsibility of representation for the Mexican State, successor state to all the negative and worst aspects of colonialism and neoliberalism.
In this sense, the debt of the Mexican State is enormous and is still pending to be paid. So great is that debt that to in order understand its magnitude it is necessary to recall that the under the current constitutional and legislative system, in this and the other nation-states of the continent, the reputed claim of federal jurisdiction is based on the feudal Alexandrian Papal Bulls Inter Caetera (1493) that arbitrarily divided the so-called "new world" between Spain and Portugal.
These actions which occurred more than 500 years ago marked for destruction the destiny of the indigenous peoples on this continent, who have been forced to endure for five centuries the aftermath of Doctrine of Discovery of Christendom that has allowed for the normalization of permanent campaigns of conquest and ethnocide.
Today, with the legaloid argument that our traditional territories and lands
are relegated to the status of “original property of the nation"
in consequence to the dictum of the Papal Bulls Inter Caetera (1493),
the invasions and plunder continue. Today, for this same reason, now there are
cases in which we Maya who were born and have lived for generations on the
route laid out for the so-called Maya Train Project to pass through are
treated as invaders in our own homelands.
So it is not enough for the Mexican State to ask for forgiveness, as there are still ongoing consequences of the invasion, conquest and colonization that must be repaired, including the damage suffered by the Mayans during the so-called War of the Castes.
It is necessary to restore and compensate the natural, material and human resources of which the peninsular Mayan people were deprived, because in consequence to that dispossession and the ethnocide suffered by the Mayans, a cupola of regional, national and foreign elites still live in criminal opulence.
The construction of the AMLO Train in Mayan territory, and other similar megaprojects imposed in other regions of the country such as Oaxaca, follow the same trajectory of invading, dispossessing and destroying natural resources of the indigenous territories.
The decision to commemorate the consummation of independence this year is yet another regrettable mistake. The Indigenous Peoples of Mexico have had a decisive participation in all the main wars that sought Independence, the Reform and the Revolution, but in none of them did they obtain the restitution of what was lost during the wars of the conquest. In that sense, there is not much that the Mayan people can celebrate.
I can tell you much more, but I will end by demanding that the projects in which
the government has invested millions in resources, as in the case of the AMLO Train,
would be better utilized where they are necessary to vaccinate the entire
population of the country sooner, to sufficiently boost indigenous and peasant
agriculture, to strengthen health systems, increase the supply of medicines and
merchandise, promote indigenous intercultural education; to solve housing
problems and address urgent issues such as femicides and the insecurity that
lacerates the communities of the Indigenous Peoples and almost the entire society.
So, Mr. President, it is not enough to hold a ceremony to apologize for what has happened if the problems here indicated are left without being addressed, without answers and solutions. It would be just one more demagogic event and a new affront to the Mayan Masewal people.
Weyanone', We are here.
Jach maayaon, We are Maya
Kuxaanon, We live.
Sincerely,
Carlos Chablé Mendoza
Chronicler of Noj Kaaj Santa Cruz Xbáalam Naj,
Felipe Carrillo Puerto (Current City)
YouTube:
Tenamaztle
The Legend of Truth and the Doctrines of Power
************
Western Shoshone Self Determination and the Doctrine of Discovery
Inter American Commission on Human Rights
Organization of American States
Western Shoshone Nation v. United States of America
Re: Mary
and Cary Dann, Case 11.140
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NLG Webinar:
"Dismantling the Doctrine of Discovery: Decolonization & Indigenous Self-Determination"
TONATIERRA - Message to Tom Lantos Human Rights Commission: Human Rights of Indigenous Peoples in the Americas
A comprehensive historical understanding and analysis of the systematic human rights violations against Indigenous Peoples in the Americas [North-Central-South] must necessarily integrate a critical position in regard to the nefarious and racist Doctrine of Discovery of Christendom (October 12, 1492) which continues to be normalized by the successor states across the continent.
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