[NetBehaviour] EZLN: A letter of explanation...and/or, perhaps, farewell

[ivan lópez]

http://chiapas.indymedia.org/display.php3?article_id=113875


Originally published in Spanish by the EZLN
*************************************
Translated by irlandesa


Zapatista Army of National Liberation

Mexico.


June 21, 2005.

To National and International Civil Society:

Señora, señorita, señor, young person, boy, girl:

This is not a letter of farewell. At times it is going to seem as if it 
is, that it is a farewell, but it is not. It is a letter of 
explanation. Well, that is what we shall attempt. This was originally 
going to go out as a communiqué, but we have chosen this form because, 
for good or for bad, when we have spoken with you we have almost always 
done so in this most personal tone.

We are the men, women, children and old ones of the Zapatista Army of 
National Liberation. Perhaps you remember us - we rose up in arms on 
January 1, 1994, and ever since then we have kept up our war against 
the forgetting, and we have resisted the war of extermination which the 
different governments have waged, unsuccessfully, against us. We live 
in the furthest corner of this country which is called Mexico. In that 
corner which is called "Indian Peoples." Yes, like that, plural. 
Because, for reasons we shall not give here, the plural is used in this 
corner for everything: we suffer, we die, we fight, we resist.

Now, as you know quite well, it so happens that, ever since that dawn 
of the beginning of '94, we have dedicated our struggle - first with 
fire and then with the word - our efforts, our life and our death, 
exclusively to the Indian peoples of Mexico for the recognition of 
their rights and their culture. It was natural - we zapatistas are 
overwhelmingly indigenous. Mayan indigenous, to be more precise. But, 
in addition, the indigenous in this country - despite having been the 
foundation of this Nation's great transformations - are still the 
social group which has been the most attacked and the most exploited. 
If they have shown no mercy against anyone with their military wars and 
the wars disguised as "political", the wars of usurpation, of conquest, 
of annihilation, of marginalization, of ignorance - it has been against 
the indigenous. The war against us has been so intense and brutal that 
it has become routine to think that the indigenous will only be able to 
escape from their conditions of marginalization and poverty if they 
stop being indigenous...or if they are dead. We have been fighting to 
not die and to not cease being indigenous. We have fought to be - alive 
and indigenous - part of this nation which has been lifted up over our 
backs. The Nation for whom we have been the feet (almost always unshod) 
with which it has walked in its decisive moments. The Nation for whom 
we have been the arms and hands which have made the earth bear fruit 
and which have erected the large buildings, edifices, churches and 
palaces that those who have everything take such pride in. The Nation 
of which - through word, look and manner, that is, through culture - we 
are the root.

Are we raining insult upon injury? Perhaps it's because we are in June, 
the sixth month of the year. Well, we just wanted to point out that the 
beginning of our uprising was not just a "Here we are", shouted to a 
Nation that was deaf and dumb because of the authoritarianism above. It 
was also a "This is what we are and shall continue to be...but now with 
dignity, with democracy, with justice, with liberty." You know this 
quite well, because, among other things, you have been accompanying us 
since then.

Unfortunately, after more than 7 years committed to that path, in April 
of 2001, politicians from all the parties (primarily the PRI, PAN and 
PRD) and the self-styled "three branches of the Union" (the presidency, 
the congress and the courts) formed an alliance in order to deny the 
Indian peoples of Mexico the constitutional recognition of their rights 
and culture. And they did so without caring about the great national 
and international movement which had arisen and joined together for 
that purpose. The great majority, including the media, were in 
agreement that that debt should be settled. But the politicians don't 
care about anything that doesn't get them money, and they rejected the 
same proposal that they had approved years before when the San Andrés 
Accords were signed and the Cocopa drafted a proposal for 
constitutional reform. They did so because they thought that, after a 
little time had passed, everyone would forget. And perhaps many people 
forgot, but we did not. We have memory, and it was they: the PRI, the 
PAN, the PRD, the President of the Republic, the deputies and senators 
and the justices of the Supreme Court of the Nation. Yes, the Indian 
peoples continue today in the underbelly of this Nation, and they 
continue to suffer the same racism they have for 500 years. It doesn't 
matter what they are saying now, when they are preparing for the 
elections (in other words, to secure positions that will make them 
profits): they are not going to do anything for the good of the 
majority, nor are they going to listen to anything that isn't money.

If we zapatistas pride ourselves on anything it's honoring the word, 
the honest and principled word. All this time we have been telling you 
that we will try the path of dialogue and negotiation in order to 
achieve our demands. We told you that we would make great efforts in 
the peaceful struggle. We told you that we would focus on the 
indigenous struggle. And so it has been. We have not deceived you.

All the help which you have so generously contributed to this noble 
cause and through those means has been for that and for nothing else. 
We have used nothing for anything else. All the humanitarian help and 
aid which we have received from Mexico and from throughout the world 
has been used only for improving the living conditions of the zapatista 
indigenous communities and in peaceful initiatives for the recognition 
of indigenous rights and culture. Nothing of what was received has been 
used for the acquisition of arms or for any war preparations. Not only 
because we haven't needed it (the EZLN has maintained its military 
capacity intact since 1994), but above all because it wouldn't have 
been honest to tell you that your help was for one thing and to use it 
for another. Not one centavo of the help received for peace with 
justice and dignity has been used for war. We have not needed help for 
making war. For peace, yes.

We have, of course, used our word to refer to (and in some cases to 
express our solidarity with) other struggles in Mexico and the world, 
but just that far. And many times, knowing that we could do more, we 
had to contain ourselves, because our efforts - as we had told you - 
were exclusively by and for the indigenous.

It has not been easy. Do you remember the March of the1,111? The 
Consulta of 5000 in 1999? The March of the Color of the Earth in 2001? 
Well, imagine then what we felt when we saw and heard the injustices 
and the hatred directed against campesinos, workers, students, 
teachers, working persons, homosexuals and lesbians, young people, 
women, old ones, children. Imagine what our heart felt.

We were touched by a pain, a fury, an indignation which we already knew 
because it has been, and is, ours. But now we were touched by it in the 
other. And we heard the "we" which inspires us wanting to become 
larger, to make itself more collective, more national. But no, we had 
said just the indigenous, and we had to honor that. I believe it's 
because of our way - in other words, that we would prefer to die before 
we would betray our word.

Now we are consulting with our heart in order to see if we are going to 
say and do something else. If the majority says yes, then we are going 
to do everything possible to honor it. Everything, even dying if it's 
necessary. We do not want to appear dramatic. We are only saying it in 
order to make it clear how far we are willing to go.. In other words, 
not "until they give us a position, an amount of money, a promise, a 
candidacy."

Perhaps some may remember how, six months ago, we started with the 
"what is missing is missing." Then fine, as is obvious, the hour has 
arrived to decide whether we are going to proceed to find what is 
missing. Not to find, to build. Yes, to build "something else."

In some of the communiqués of the past few days, we let you know that 
we have entered into an internal consulta. We shall soon have the 
results, and we will inform you of them. Meanwhile then, we are taking 
the opportunity to write you. We have always spoken to you with 
sincerity, and also to those who are our heart and guardian, our Votan 
Zapata, the zapatista communities, our collective command.

It will be a difficult and hard decision, just as our life and our 
struggle have been. For four years we have been preparing the 
conditions in order to present our peoples with doors and windows so 
that, when the moment comes, everyone had all the ingredients in place 
for choosing which window to peer through and which door to open. And 
that is our way. In other words, the EZLN leadership does not lead, 
rather it seeks paths, steps, company, direction, pace, destination. 
Several. And then they present the peoples with those paths, and they 
analyze with them what would happen if we follow one or the other 
course. Because, depending on the path we travel, there are things 
which will be good and things which will be bad. And then they - the 
zapatista communities - speak their thoughts and decide, after 
discussing and by majority, where we are all going. And then they give 
the order, and then the EZLN leadership has to organize the work or 
prepare what is needed to walk that path. Of course the EZLN leadership 
doesn't just look at what happens only to them, but they have to be 
bound to the peoples and to touch their hearts and to make themselves, 
as they say, the same thing. Then it becomes all our gazes, all our 
ear, all our thoughts, all our heart. But what if, for whatever reason, 
the leadership does not look, or hear, or think, or feel like all of 
us. Or some parts aren't seen or something else isn't heard or other 
thoughts aren't thought or felt. Well, then, that is why everyone is 
consulted. That is why everyone is asked. That is why agreement is 
taken among everyone. If the majority says no, then the leadership has 
to seek another way, and to present another way to the peoples in order 
to propose until we collectively reach a decision. In other words, the 
people govern.

Now the collective which we are will make a decision. They are weighing 
the pros and cons. They are carefully making the calculations, what is 
lost and what is gained. And, seeing that there is not a little to be 
lost, it will be decided whether it is worth it.

Perhaps, in some people's scales, there will be much weight given to 
what we have achieved. Perhaps, in other people's scales, there will be 
more weight given to the indignation and shame caused by seeing our 
earth and skies destroyed by the stupid avarice of Power. In any event, 
we cannot remain passive, just contemplating, as a gang of ruffians 
strips our Patria of everything that gives it and everyone existence: 
dignity.

Ah, well, many turns now. We are writing you for what may be the last 
time in order to give you back your promised word of support. It is not 
little that we have achieved in the indigenous struggle, and that has 
been - as we have told you in public and in private - because of your 
help. We believe you can be proud, without any shame, of all the good 
that we zapatistas, along with you, have built up to this point. And 
know that it has been an honor, undeserved in any light, that people 
like you have walked at our side.

Now we shall decide whether we are going to do something else, and we 
will make the results public at the proper time. We are now making 
clear - in order to end the speculations - that this "other thing" does 
not entail any offensive military action on our part. We are not, on 
our part, planning nor discussing reinitiating offensive military 
combat. Ever since February-March of 1994 our entire military presence 
has been, and is, defensive. The government should say whether, on its 
part, there are any offensive war preparations, whether by the federal 
forces or by their paramilitaries. And the PRI and the PRD should say 
if they are planning any attack against us with the paramilitaries they 
are supporting in Chiapas.

If it is the decision of the zapatista majority, those who have helped 
us up to now in the exclusively indigenous struggle can, without any 
shame or regret, distance themselves from the "other thing" to which 
Comandante Tacho referred in the San Cristóbal de Las Casas plaza in 
January of 2003, two and a half years ago. In addition, there is a 
communiqué which establishes, from here out, that release and which can 
be presented in a job application, curriculum vitae, coffee klatch, 
editorial office, roundtable, grandstand, forum, stage, book jacket, 
footnote, colloquium, candidacy, book of regrets or newspaper column 
and which, in addition, has the advantage of being able to be exhibited 
as defense evidence in any court (don't laugh, there's a precedent: in 
1994, some indigenous detained by the bad government - and who weren't 
zapatistas - were released by a judge, validating a letter from the 
CCRI-CG in which it released those persons from what the EZLN had done. 
In other words, as the lawyers say, "there is legal precedent").

But those who find in their heart an echo, even if it is small, of our 
new word and who feel themselves called by the path, step, pace, 
company and destination which we have chosen, may perhaps decide to 
renew their help (or to participate directly)...knowing that it will be 
"another thing". Like that, without tricks, without deceit, without 
hypocrisy, without lies.

We thank the women. All the girls, teenagers, young women, señoritas, 
señoras and old ones (and those who were changing from one to the other 
of those calendars throughout these 12 years) who helped us, who 
accompanied us and who, not a few times, made our pain and our steps 
their own. To all of them, Mexicans and from other countries, who 
helped us and who walked with us. In everything we did you were the 
huge majority. Perhaps because we share along with you, although each 
in their own way and place, discrimination, contempt...and death.

We thank the national indigenous movement, which did not sell itself 
for government posts, for travel allowances, for the flattery that the 
powerful classify as "fit for indigenous and animals." The one which 
listened to our word and gave us theirs. The one which opened its 
heart, its home, to us. The one which resisted and resists with 
dignity, raising very high the color we are of the earth.

We thank the young men and women of Mexico and of the world. Those who 
were boys, girls or teenagers that '94 and who nobly grew up without 
holding back their eyes or their ears. Those who reached youth or, 
despite the pages torn from the calendar, remained there, extending the 
hand of their rebellion to our dark hand. Those who chose to come and 
share days, weeks, months, years, our dignified poverty, our struggle, 
our hope and our foolish endeavor.

We thank the homosexuals, lesbians, transsexuals, transgender persons 
and "everyone in their own way." Those who shared with us their 
struggle for respect for difference, knowing that it is not a defect to 
be hidden. Those who demonstrated that courage has nothing to do with 
testosterone and who, time and again, gave us some of the most 
beautiful lessons of dignity and nobility we have received.

We thank the intellectuals, artists and scientists, from Mexico and the 
world, who helped us in the struggle for the indigenous. Few movements 
or organizations can pride themselves on having had the backing (always 
critical, and we thank them for that) of so much intelligence, 
ingenuity and creativity. You already know that we always listened to 
you with respect and attention, even when we didn't share your points 
of view and that something of the light you shone helped to illuminate 
our dark paths.

We thank the honest workers of the press and the decent media who 
showed, truthfully and to the entire world, what they saw and heard, 
and who respected, without distorting, our voice and path. We extend 
you our solidarity in these hard moments you are going through in the 
exercise of your profession, where you are risking your lives, you are 
attacked and, like us, you find no justice.

And, so that no one is missed, we thank everyone who, honestly and 
sincerely, helped us.

I said, at the beginning of this letter, that it was not a farewell. 
Well, it so happens that for some people it is. Although for others it 
will be what is, in reality, a promise...Because what is missing can 
now be seen...

Vale. Salud and, from heart to heart, thank you for everything.

In the name of all the zapatistas of the EZLN.

 From the mountains of the Mexican Southeast.

Subcomandante Insurgente Marcos

Mexico, in the sixth month of the year 2005.

PS - You can see now that we aren't thinking about playing football. Or 
not thinking only about that. Because some day we will play against the 
Internazionale of Milan. We, or what is left of us.