Government Allows Misleading and False Information to Spread in the Corporate Media

On October 24, Chiapan state police arrested Rocelio de la Cruz Gonzalez and Jose Manuel de la Torre Hernandez, both leaders of the Emiliano Zapata Peasant Organization (OCEZ).  Narco News' Fernando Leon reports that the men say police tortured them during interrogation.  De la Torre Hernandez said in a statement: "Multiple times they put a nylon bag over my head, suffocating me, so that I would answer affirmatively to a list of questions.  [The questions included] if our organization OCEZ has weapons and a relationship with the church and with former and current Carranza mayors.  They also shot mineral water up my nose until I passed out."  De la Torre told his lawyer that police made him sign papers without reading them during the torture session.  Police tortured him until he passed out, then they woke him up to sign papers while he was still groggy.

On October 25, a contact sent this reporter an email with the subject "Official Communique."  The email was written in the style of a government press release, but it contained no media contact information nor was it signed by a government agency.  The contact believed the email was the government's official press release regarding the de la Torre Hernandez and de la Cruz Gonzalez arrests.  The contact had received the email from a local reporter who also seemed to believe the email was the government's official press release.  However, this "Official Communique" did not appear on the Chiapas state government's "Public Relations Institute" website, where all official state government press releases are posted, nor did it appear on the Chiapas State Attorney General's Office website, where press releases regarding arrests are posted. 

The "Official Communique's" absence from the websites where all official government communiques are posted is particularly noteworthy due to the wild claims made in the "communique." 

Ex-Workers from Luz y Fuerza del Centro Tried to Enter the Pachuca Station and Hung Red and Black Banners in the Nuevo Necaxa, Puebla, Hydroelectric Plant

Wire Reports
El Universal

Ex-workers from defunct Luz y Fuerza del Centro power company intensified their actions in simultantaneous protests outside the company's buildings in two states.

In Hidalgo, the protesters created a protest encampment (plantón) outside the Juandho division in the Tetepango municipality, where the majority of the residents are ex-Luz y Fuerza workers.  Meanwhile, in Tula and Pachuca, they burned banners, flags, and sticks. The situation remains tense, and they are expected to be forcibly removed.

Conflicting Press Releases Cast Doubt on Government Claims

This past October 16, the Mexican Federal Police transferred Chiapan peasant leader Jose Manuel “Don Chema” Hernandez Martinez to a maximum-security federal prison located in Nayarit, 26 hours from his home.  Don Chema is a leader of the Emiliano Zapata Peasant Organization (OCEZ).  The government claims that it transferred him “for his own safety.”

On October 9, the government claims to have uncovered a massive weapons stockpile—reportedly the largest weapons seizure in the history of Chiapas, and the biggest weapons seizure in the entire country so far this year.  The Chiapas state government says in a press release that “according to statements made by the men detained in this operation, the arsenal would be linked to José Manuel Hernández Martínez.”

Government Transferred “Don Chema” to a Federal Maximum-Security Prison

The way the government is treating Jose Manuel Hernandez Martinez, also known as “Don Chema,” one would think he’s the head of a drug cartel.

A Spanish Company and National Action Party Members Hope to Exploit Luz y Fuerza's Fiber Optic Network

Mexican Electrical Workers Union (SME) Secretary General Martin Esparza claims that President Felipe Calderon busted his union in order to take control of a 1,100-kilometer fiber optic network.  The fiber optic network in question was built with public money and was the property of Luz y Fuerza del Centro, the government-owned electricity company that the military and federal police shut down this past weekend.  The union's opposition to Calderon's agenda of cronyism and privatization is at the heart of the dispute, according to Esparza.

In an interview with the Mexican weekly Proceso, Esparza explains how politicians from the president's National Action Party (PAN) facilitated a foreign company's exploitation of Luz y Fuerza's fiber optic cable, while simultaneously stifling Luz y Fuerza's bid for a permit to utilize its own infrastructure to provide television, internet, and telephone services.

Federal Agents Take Them By Force to Power Stations with Problems

by Patricia Muñoz and Fabiola Martinez, La Jornada

Workers "are being kidnapped" by federal forces in order to force them to "cooperate" with the Federal Electricity Commission (CFE) in power stations that have problems providing electricity to customers, denounced the Mexican Electrical Workers Union (SME).

"The federal government's disgrace and desperation has become intolerable, and our patience is wearing thin" because the Federal Police (PF) and the Military go to workers' homes to "detain them and force them to work in order to confront the widespread power outages that the CFE engineers have been completely incapable of resolving," said SME spokesman Fernando Amezcua.

Calderon Uses 6,000 Federal Agents to Fire Over 44,000 Luz y Fuerza Workers


Mexican Electrical Workers Union members protest the summary firing of 44,000 members. Photo: La Jornada

In the middle of the night last Saturday, President Felipe Calderon sent six thousand soldiers and militarized Federal Police to take over state power company Luz y Fuerza installations in Mexico City and the states of Mexico, Puebla, Morelos, and Hidalgo.  Immediately following the takeover, Calderon issued an executive order closing Luz y Fuerza.  Because no law or decree can go into effect until it is published in the federal government's Official Diary of the Federation, the government published the executive order in a special edition of the Official Diary of the Federation to coincide with the military and police raids that closed Luz y Fuerza.

Government Uses the Explosions Against Leftist Strongholds on University Campuses

Throughout the month of September, over ten bombs were placed in banks, a car dealership, a luxury clothing store, a small police station, and an animal testing laboratory in Mexico City and the states of Guanajuato, Nayarit, and Jalisco.  Most exploded; no injuries were reported. 

The Security Situation has Worsened, and Mexicans are Desperate for Policy Change... Any Policy Change

by Sabina Berman, Proceso

All debate ends when the first gunshots are fired. When the boots of the first battalion hit a city's streets, a forced silence falls over the civilians.  A fearful silence that entails two hopes:

First: God willing, the best will win the war and it will be quick.  Second: Whoever wins, let it be quick.

This is a universal effect of war that expectedly occurred in Mexico three years ago, when the current administration sent the Mexican Military to the cities, defying the very definition of war.

Neighbors Suspect Police Kidnapped "El Chema" and Will Kill Him

September 30 -- Early this morning, people dressed as members of the Mexican Federal Electricity Commission (CFE) kidnapped Jose Manuel Hernandez Martinez, aka "El Chema."  El Chema is one of the leaders of the Emiliano Zapata Peasant Organization (OCEZ).  His whereabouts remain unknown, and fellow OCEZ members fear that he will be killed.  Members of the organization believe that police kidnapped El Chema, although the kidnappers never identified themselves other than as CFE employees.

According to information that OCEZ member Jose Manuel de la Torre provided to Narco News, the OCEZ believes that El Chema's kidnapping is in retaliation for a successful land occupation and hunger strike that 13 OCEZ members held this past July.  As a result of the hunger strike, the Chiapan government agreed to legalize 215 hectares of the occupied lands.  The government handed the legalized lands over to OCEZ members two weeks ago.