Ciudad
Juárez Communiqué
Movimiento
por un Economía Solidaria en las Américas (MESA)
Iglesias Trabajando juntas por una Economía de la Vida
[Comunicado
de Ciudad Juárez en Español] 
Mouvement pour une économie de solidarité en
Amériques (MESA)
Églises travaillant ensemble pour une économie
de la vie
[Communiqué
de Ciudad Juárez en Francais]
Movement for a Solidarity Economy in the Americas (MESA)
Churches Working Together for an Economy of Life
[Download
English Communiqué]
Take
Action Against the Land Grab
Communiqué:
From October 1 to 3, 2008, representatives of MESA
met in Ciudad Juárez, Mexico, to investigate the impacts
of trade agreements in that city and the continent. Inspired
by a theological vision of God's economy, a household table
where all belong and are welcome, MESA brings together representatives
of churches and faith-based organizations from Canada, Mexico,
Central America and the United States of America to educate
and raise awareness among the citizenry, and advocate on issues
related to just trade and sustainable economics.
MESA
representatives met with inhabitants of Lomas de Poleo, a community
currently under siege by a powerful local businessman. This
businessman wants the land of Lomas de Poleo and is intent on
driving out this small community of 200 families. There have
been several legal rulings on this disputed land in favour of
the community of Lomas de Poleo. Not deterred by legal rulings,
this businessman has built a fence around the community and
placed armed guards at the only entrance who only permit residents
to enter. During the meeting with representatives of MESA, the
community representatives received an emergency call telling
them that armed guards had begun to demolish their homes. They
rushed back to Lomas Poleo and were terrified to find that two
houses had already been destroyed. In the third home a man mounted
on a horse and armed with a rope and gun was ready to lasso
the remaining residents, including a child, from the last room
standing in that home, The local police refused repeated and
desperate calls to investigate.
Unfortunately
this struggle for life and land in the face of neoliberal mega
projects is a reality that is repeated throughout Latin America.MESA
representatives visited the site where eight murdered women
were found in a vacant downtown lot, today marked by pink crosses,
now a potent symbol associated with the city. At the Pasos del
Norte human rights center, we also met with women from "That
Our Daughters Return Home" who told heart-breaking stories
as sisters, daughters and mothers of disappeared and murdered
women in the city. Estimates of numbers of women killed over
the past few years run between 300-400 women, with very of these
murder cases successfully prosecuted.
MESA
representatives met with representatives of labour and maquiladoras
(assembly plants) where the average wage including bonuses is
about 2,500 pesos (US$250) a month and the estimated basic cost
of living for a family of four is approximately 8,000 pesos
(US$800) a month .
MESA
representatives heard about human rights advocacy in a city
where the murder rate as of October 3, 2008 was already 1,048
people, where federal troops in Humvees and mounted machine
guns come into the city along with signs declaring they are
here to help, and a recurring theme is a lack of investigation,
the absence of political will and the inability of courts to
bring perpetrators to justice, in other words - impunity.MESA
representatives also received a compelling presentation from
Raúl Morena, Professor of Economics at the University
of San Salvador, on corporate and government plans for large-scale
infrastructure projects throughout the region as part of the
Plan Puebla Panama. These planned megaprojects further threaten
local communities and will irrecoverably destroy ecosystems
and the biological diversity within them.Here along the historic
Camino Real where fences, gun crosshairs, and boundaries are
potent signs of exclusion. Many of the challenges of North and
Meso-American integration stand in painful contrast to an inclusive
table, the vision of the Gospel. Through worship, reflection
and dialogue, the MESA representatives brought the suffering
and hope of the people of Ciudad Juárez into their hearts.
Drawing on the perennial hope of the Gospel expressed in Rev.
22:2 for the healing of the nations, MESA representatives pledged
to work for healing and an economy in the service of life for
all.
For more
details on this visit and the work of MESA, please contact:
Canada Rusa
Jeremic, KAIROS
El Salvador Héctor
Fernández
Mexico Lourdes
Villagomez, Centro des Estudios Ecumenicos,
United States of America Andrew
Kang Bartlett, Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.)
We
have a concrete action before us sent by Father Bill Morton,
the Catholic priest who lived in Lomas de Poleo for many years,
accompanying the people there, and forwarded to MESA participants
and now to all of you by West Cosgrove, with Casa Puente in
El Paso. Father Morton's letter is here:
Dear
Friends,
Many of you are familiar with the land dispute in Lomas del
Poleo in which two men have been murdered, two children burned
to death and in which the Zaragozas and their surrogates continue
to use violence, terror and even kidnapping to remove the residents
from this piece of land right on the Mexico/New Mexico border.
Please copy/paste English and Spanish version of the letter
below, and sign with your name, city/state
and email this on Wednesday, Thursday or Friday of this week
to the two email addresses noted below. Please personalize and
sign it. Don't just forward it, please.
Please
invite anyone in your network of friends, families, civic, church
and other groups to do the same. If anyone is unfamiliar with
this "concentration camp" in Juarez, go to http://www.pasodelsur.com
for a video and more information. We would like to flood Chihuahua
Governor Reyes Baeza with messages sent the same week soliciting
his intervention to stop the violence and mediate a just, peaceful
solution.
Please send the e-mails to the two following addresses related
to the Governor/State Government Offices. (You can copy
and paste (or type) the addresses into your email 'To' field).
If
you are willing to do something more, like fax, call or send
surface mail copy of your letter, there is information at the
Chihuahua official state
website.
To:
<secretarioparticularchihuahua@hotmail.com>,
<marcagob@chihuahua.gob.mx>
This action is more urgent than ever. In the last two weeks,
four more homes have been demolished, two elderly residents
have been kidnapped and tortured by the Mexican military, and
the residents' access to water and electricity continues to
be denied. A deep ditch has been dug around the elementary school
house making it difficult for the students and their families
to gain entry. The teachers are frequently absent, now, due
to escalating violence and attempts by Zaragoza surrogates to
close the school and force the families to go to another school
in the relocation area.
On
Saturday a small group of the Lomas del Poleo Alliance of Las
Cruces met with New Mexico Governor, Bill Richardson, who indicated
he would be willing to intervene since the disputed land, literally,
borders on his state of New Mexico. Lomas del Poleo is also
in the path of a proposed multi-billion dollar, bi-national
development plan involving major business figures from both
sides of the border, as well as government officials from New
Mexico and Chihuahua.
Thank you for your solidarity on behalf of the human rights
of the residents of Lomas del Poleo.
Bill Morton
SPANISH
LETTER TO USE AS IS OR MODIFY
Sr. José Reyes Baeza
Gobernador del Estado de Chihuahua, México.
P
r e s e n t e
Debido
a la escalada de violencia desatada en las últimas semanas
en contra de los habitantes de la parte alta de la colonia Granjas
Lomas del Poleo, por parte de trabajadores al servicio de Pedro
y Jorge Zaragoza Fuentes, le solicitamos su inmediata intervención
para que las autoridades correspondientes garanticen la seguridad
de los vecinos de esa colonia. Asimismo, le urgimos ordene a
la Procuraduría de Justicia del Estado la inmediata investigación
de los delitos cometidos en esa zona, los cuales han sido oportunamente
denunciados ante esa representación.
Como
debe ser de su amplio conocimiento, las tierras de la Colonia
Granjas Lomas del Poleo están sujetas a una disputa legal
que se dirime -- a través de distintas demandas en el
Tribunal Unitario Agrario Número Cinco--, por lo que
le solicitamos, también, obligue a los empresarios Zaragoza
Fuentes respeten los tiempos de la ley y detengan inmediatamente
la campaña de presión y hostigamiento que han
levantado en contra de los vecinos en Lomas del Poleo. Es obvio
que lo que pretenden estos dos empresarios es obligar a los
colonos a que abandonen sus tierras, antes de que los tribunales
competentes rindan su fallo final.
En
suma, Sr Gobernador, lo único que le pedimos es que haga
cumplir la ley y restaure el Estado de derecho en la colonia
Lomas del Poleo.
A T E N T A M E N T E:
(Your name, title, city, state)
ENGLISH
LETTER TO USE AS IS OR MODIFY
Honorable Jose Reyes Baeza
Governor of the State of Chihuahua
Republic of Mexico
Owing
to the escalation of violence in recent weeks against the inhabitants
of the Colonia of Lomas del Poleo by the employees of the brothers,
Jorge and Pedro Zaragoza, we are asking your immediate intervention
so that the appropriate authorities might guarantee the security
of the residents in this Colonia. Also we urge that you order
the State Attorney General's office to immediately investigate
the crimes committed in this area which have already been presented
to the Attorney General.
As
you well know the lands in Lomas del Poleo are the subject of
a legal dispute in the Agrarian Court Number Five in Chihuahua
so we are also asking you to oblige the Zaragozas to respect
the law and immediately stop the campaign of oppression and
harassment against the inhabitants of Lomas del Poleo. It is
obvious that these two businessmen are trying to get the inhabitants
to abandon their lands before the courts make their decision.
In
short, Mr. Governor we only ask that the law be followed and
restored.
Sincerely:
(Your name, title, city, state, country)
|
