Dear friends,

We are excited to share this update from Oaxaca with you and we'd
like to underline and put emphasis on two points made below: first,
that there is a great need for financial contributions to realize
this historic reportage and investigation; and second, people should
contact us right away to make plans to host these correspondents for
speaking engagements upon their return, when they will be looking
for all kinds of occasions to share what they have learned. Please
contact us right away for these reasons and also to weigh in and
comment on their reportage and the situation in Oaxaca and more
broadly.

In struggle,
Tony--for the Libros Revolucion staff--(213) 488-1303


Revolution Online Special Report, December 19, 2006

Report from Oaxaca
by Luciente Zamora and Nina Armand

This is the first report from two Revolution correspondents,
Luciente Zamora, and Nina Armand, who are now in Oaxaca as part of a
delegation whose mission is to bring international attention to the
situation in that southern Mexican state. As the two correspondents
wrote in a letter in Revolution #74: "Repression is hitting hard
against a powerful struggle that has rocked Oaxaca for months and
inspired many people throughout Mexico and other parts of the world.
Now more than ever there is a need to hear from the people who have
been fighting with such determination, to bring to light the
government-inflicted terror currently unfolding, and to get a deeper
understanding of how people are confronting these new challenges and
what the implications of all this are for emancipatory struggle on
both sides of the U.S./Mexico border."

Watch this website (revcom.us) and get the next issue of Revolution
for further on-the-scene reports from Oaxaca.

Oaxaca, Mexico, December 18— Contrasted against the blue sky, the
red noche buenas blooming throughout the city, along with the sounds
of women cooking and children playing in the marketplace, make the
center of town seem almost…normal. Oaxaca is not the same place it
was before the people stood up in June of this year. The fact that
for months the people raised their heads throughout Oaxaca—from the
center region and through much of the countryside—cannot be erased.
Oaxaca demanded to be heard.

* * * * *

On Sunday, December 17, 43 prisoners who had been detained in a
prison in Tepic, Nayarit were released. Immediately upon their
arrival back to Oaxaca City, many of the people released began
sharing stories of the November 25th repression when the Federal
Preventive Police (PFP)—which had been occupying the zocalo, the
central city square, since October—attacked protesters demanding the
ouster of Oaxaca's hated governor, Ulises Ruiz Ortiz. More than 150
people were brutally beaten and arrested in the area around the
zocalo, including many people who were coming home from work and
shopping.

Magdalena was coming home from work on the afternoon of the 25th.
She's a 50-year-old widow and works as a housekeeper to support her
family. She had heard of the popular movement, but didn't really
know too much about it. She remembered some of her neighbors telling
her that the teachers were just troublemakers and that it was time
for the authorities to bring down order. But on the 25th everything
changed. She was swept up along with many others by the PFP while
she was in the town center. She was hit, thrown down on the floor,
had her hands tied and told—along with other women—that they were
going to die and that after they were killed their bodies would be
thrown in garbage cans where nobody would find them.

Magdalena saw her relatives bloodied and beat up. For the 21 days
she was in prison, she and the others arrested that day had no
contact with the outside world. For Magdalena, what is burned into
her consciousness is the desperation of the women prisoners who
don't know where their children are and whether or not they are
eating. Just as arbitrarily as she'd been grabbed off the street on
the 25th, she was told that she was going home. She can't stop
thinking about the women she left behind.

Before, Magdalena hadn't given much thought to the people's
struggle. Her experience has affected her profoundly. She says after
what the government has done to her she wants to participate in the
struggle however she can. She now remembers the repression against
the people of Atenco, who were fighting against the government's
moves to take their land, and never would have believed she'd find
herself identifying with the women who were brutalized there. She is
most of all driven by an urgency to free the prisoners who remain in
the conditions she's just escaped, and she says that though she
can't read or write she wants to be involved in whatever way she
can. She says she doesn't seek to be rich and live in a mansion like
URO, but she demands respect and a more just world—not just for
herself, but for everyone.

* * * * *

The air is still thick in Oaxaca. In the past weeks police
helicopters have occasionally flown low over the city—their blades a
reminder of the brute force of the state. Officially the PFP forces
have withdrawn from the city, but there are still eyes and ears
everywhere. Just last night Florentino Lopez, Alejandro Ortiz, and
Macario Padilla, prominent figures in the APPO movement were
detained at a stoplight and were beaten and arrested. They were
released the same night—but the threat of more repression is clear,
as is determination on the people's side.

----

Support the Revolution Reporting Trip to Oaxaca

From Luciente Zamora and Nina Armand:

"To accomplish what we're setting out to do, we need your support.
Primarily and urgently, we need funds to finance all this. We also
need you to spread the word—pass on our articles, send them out to
your listserves and e-mail lists and arrange speaking engagements in
neighborhoods, schools, bookstores, etc.

"Send donations* to:
RCP Publications
attn: Oaxaca reportage
PO Box 3486
Chicago, IL 60654"

* Contributions or gifts to RCP Publications are not deductible as
charitable contributions for federal income tax purposes.

Libros Revolucion
(Revolution Books)
312 W. 8th Street,
Los Angeles, CA 90014
(213) 488-1303