Zapatista eviction imminent

The Huitepec is under threat of evacuation by priísta authorities. The ecological reserve, held communally by the Zapatistas, a bone of contention in Chiapas

Hermann Bellinghausen (Sent). Huitepec Ocotal Second Section, Chiapas, 18 of January.
The Huitepec, a“ natural area and ecological reserve protected by the Zapatista community”, established by the EZLN and the Other Campaign the 13 of March of 2007 in the high territories of this community, is under serious threat of evacuation on the part of the new priísta municipal government of San Cristóbal de las Casas. At midday today nine people appeared here, state and municipal civil servants, in which appeared to be a “outpost” study of the terrain and to possibly plan a police operation to evacuate the camp of EZLN support bases of the different municipalities from the Altos, established by the Good Government Junta (JBG) of Oventic, as well as the settlers of Huitepec Ocotal Second Section, also Zapatistas, who protect an area of 102 hectares. Bursting onto the territory declared a protected area by the JBG, and intercepted by the guard of Zapatista locals and civilian observers who daily watch the high places of the Huitepec, the government delegate, Adan Ruíz Guillén, heading a group of lawyers: Gustavo Herrera, of Altos Físcalía; Magín Flores Vidal, commissioner for the conciliation of communities and towns in conflict; Javier Trinidad Ortiz, of the undersecretary's office of High Regional Operation Zone, and Gregorio Pérez Gómez of the Indigenous Office of the public prosecutor. Less than 24 hours before, the Municipal President of San Cristóbal, Mariano Diaz Ochoa, reiterated its intention to evacuate the Zapatista bases using public force: “we are talking with the agent of the Federal Public Ministry and with the state police, and analysing the declarations of the municipal agents to take corresponding action in agreement with the law” (Fourth Power, 17 of January). Since its electoral campaign, the priísta cacique - who governed San Cristóbal during the government Roberto Albores announced that he would finish with the “invasion” before the priísta settlers of the neighboring communities of Alcanfores and Huitepec Ocotal, were suddenly afflicted by a love for nature on earth that does not belong to them, after arranging to yield their own land before the pressure of the increasing urban sprawl of San Cristóbal in to the neighboring valley of Jovel (one of the fastestest-growing cities in the country). In declarations to the press, Diaz Ochoa misestimated that the evacuation would cause problems with the EZLN. With impeccable reasoning, he explained: “I do not believe that there will be problems because it is a reserve that sancristobalenses have known all their lives, and have always taken care of”. (In fact, if this area stays conserved so extraordinarily it is because the coleta city has not discovered its existence or does not know it). Two hours before the eruption of civil servants and governmental agents at noon today, the civil observers of the Other Campaign and the locals witnesses the arrival via Alcanfores, of a man with a large dog; they had never seen this person before. Javier Gómez Nájera identified himself as a, “friend and neighbour” of the coleto mayor. According to versions gathered by La Jornada, the guard would have indicated to him that “where he entered he could leave” the reserve. Strangers continued appearing, and soon another gentleman with a large German Shepherd. Later on, in two light trucks and a Volkswagen sedán, arrived the aforementioned civil servants, who said they had come “to see what problems he had”, and appearing unwilling, asked “for a gentleman with a dog.” It should be remembered that since the end of 2005, when the Zapatista bases of Huitepec Ocotal proposed to declare 102 hectares a “Zapatista communal ecological reserve”, to be protected and reforested by the local community with the endorsement of the JBG of the Altos, that recognised “their total right to propose or to say how to preserve their ancestral lands”, and it declared: “the Zapatista support bases of the community never agreed to giving the land that they inherited from their parents and grandparents, for that reason they stay firm in defending their land. The springs have been co-opted to supply other populations and foreign companies like Coca Cola, without requesting permission or taking into account the true owners”. Immediately after, the government of Pablo Salazar Mendiguchía and the State Congress announced the initiative to declare the site a “protected natural area” (ANP). And a day before the declaration on the part of the EZLN of its natural area and ecological reserve, a decree was published in the Official Newspaper of the Federation that designated the site an ANP, and gave jurisdiction to the municipality of San Cristóbal. Now, the mayor (and sudden ecologist) Diaz Ochoa proudly declares: “I am going to work to evict this zone”.
Translated from Spanish by acetunini and sevastopol