\u00abMexico woke up" by Katka Kincelov\u00e1. Creative Commons. Some rights reserved.<\/i><\/p>\n
\u201cA
\ngovernment on its knees\u201d: this is how Gil Ramos describes
\nMexico\u2019s current administration. With an average of nearly 100
\nhomicides per day, 7
\njournalists killed in 8 months, an epidemic of
\ndisappearances of social activists, students and civilians,
\nand hundreds of
\nhuman right violations, it is difficult to discredit that statement.
\nIn fact, Mexico would perfectly fit with Bunker and Sullivan\u2019s definition of a
\n\u201cfailed state\u201d. Contrary to the \u201cMexican moment\u201d envisaged by Times
\nmagazine a year ago, Mexicans are living in an increasingly
\ninsecure environment, witnessing an increased level of corruption in government
\ninstitutions, and experiencing the \u201cungovernability\u201d of numerous
\nmunicipalities. Thus, far from the democratic dream of progress, citizens in
\nMexico are living in a dangerous and still fragile democracy.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Beginning with the
\nexecution of 22 people in Tlatlaya, in the state of Mexico, the past 12 months
\nhave been flooded with cases of human rights violations that have shaken
\nMexican society. Leaving aside the fact that those executed belonged to a
\ncriminal organization, the assassination of these unarmed and surrounded
\ncriminals in June 2014 demonstrated that the army was not carrying out its
\noperations with strict respect for human rights. Despite the Minister of the
\nInterior's assurances that government would \u201cprosecute
\nthis crime to the very end\u201d, this atrocity, until then the worst
\nslaughter committed by the armed forces in Pe\u00f1a Nieto\u2019s administration, has proved
\nto be only a symptom of the disease affecting the Mexican government and
\nsociety.<\/p>\n
A mere three months
\nlater, Mexico and the world were shocked by the kidnapping and \u2013as we know now \u2013
\nthe execution of 43 students in Ayotzinapa, in the state of Guerrero. On September
\n26, under orders from the Major of Iguala, dozens of students of a rural
\nteaching college were attacked, 3 were murdered, and 43 were abducted by the local
\npolice and then handed over to the United Warriors criminal organization. After
\nDNA fragments of one of the students were identified by independent
\ninvestigators, who stated that \u201cno more
\nusable DNA could be found to identify the rest of the corpses, the
\ngovernment closed the case and, in January 2015, pronounced the students dead. However,
\nin a country where there is growing evidence to confirm widespread suspicions
\nof collusion between criminal groups and the authorities, this official statement
\nhas been rejected by
\nrelatives and large sectors of the population. \u00a0<\/p>\n
Notwithstanding the
\npolitical notoriety and judicial impact of these cases, and despite the fact
\nthat 79% of Mexican citizens consider crime to be one of the biggest problems
\nin Mexico and 57% are dissatisfied with the
\ndirection of the country, the Minister of Finance has recently declared
\nthat \u201cMexico has a
\nstrong rule of law: a pronouncement that, as activists and
\nsociety in general would say, lacks any support under the current circumstances.<\/p>\n
The In addition to the sad On August 31t, Trapped between Change, of course, cannot In less than 10 months from \u00abMexico woke up" by Katka Kincelov\u00e1. Creative Commons. Some rights reserved. \u201cA government on its knees\u201d: this is how Gil Ramos describes Mexico\u2019s current administration. With an average of nearly 100 homicides per day, 7 journalists killed in 8 months, an epidemic of disappearances of social activists, students and civilians, and hundreds of human right…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1280","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/googmn.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1280","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/googmn.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/googmn.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/googmn.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/googmn.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1280"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/googmn.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1280\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/googmn.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1280"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/googmn.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1280"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/googmn.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1280"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
\nland of the dead journalists<\/strong><\/p>\n
\ncases previously described, Mexico is one in only
\n10 countries in the world where journalists have been
\nmurdered in the last nine months. According to Freedom House<\/em>, civil and
\npolitical rights in the country continue to be violated and, far
\nfrom diminishing, criminality has increased in certain parts of Mexico. Just
\nbetween 2013 and 2014, for instance, the kidnapping
\nrate in Tamaulipas went up by 22.6%, reaching the mark of 40 kidnappings
\nper 100,000 inhabitants at the end of that year. What is more, only 57% of the
\ncrimes are reported and \u2013 even more worrying \u2013 only 3% end up with
\na conviction. Thus, contrary to the Minister\u2019s picture of a \u201clawful Mexico\u201d,
\ncitizens continue to live in a country with many laws, but where impunity
\nreigns. Two more cases illustrate perfectly the situation. <\/p>\n
\nRuben Espinosa and Nadia Vera, a reporter and a social activist, both critical
\nof the government of the state of Veracruz, were found murdered in Mexico City.
\nAlthough some rushed to support the hypothesis of a robbery whilst virtually condemning
\nas foolish any other line of inquiry, both Espinosa and
\nVera had previously blamed the
\nGovernor of Veracruz for anything that might happen to them,
\ncausing a great deal of questioning across society. Just a few days later, Miguel Angel
\nJimenez, a social activist who led search parties looking for the
\nremaining 42 students of Iguala, was found dead in his taxi. Whether or not coincidences,
\nas with Ayotzinapa and Tlatlaya, these cases not only reflect the
\nineffectiveness of the Mexican judicial system, they remind us of the
\nimportance and fragility of democratic values and human rights, including a
\nfree press, freedom of association and \u2013 above all \u2013 the right to life. <\/p>\n
\ncriminal organizations and a colluding State, Mexican society needs to wake up,
\nbecome more politically engaged, and demand more accountability and responsiveness
\nfrom the State. Marching and protesting against the government is one way by
\nwhich society can work to ensure that Tlatlaya or Ayotzinapa do not happen
\nagain.<\/p>\n
\noccur immediately. And this is why scholars like Centeno say that \u201csome things
\ncan only be solved with punching\u201d, and that rural
\nmilitias are the solution to the current violence. To support
\nthis ideology, however, goes against the aim of securing democratic values and
\nrights. It is thus necessary to understand that democracy is not a dichotomous
\nnotion, but a continuum and evolving process of which Mexico is a perfect
\nexample. Two decades ago, voting was pointless in \u201cMexico's
\nperfect dictatorship\u201d. It took several years, lots of money and
\nmany lives to achieve an electoral <\/em>democracy where voting does change a
\ngovernment, does change politics, and can change the country.<\/p>\n
\nnow, citizens will vote for new governors of Veracruz \u2013the riskiest
\nplace for journalists in Mexico -, and of Oaxaca,
\nTamaulipas and Sinaloa \u2013 three of the
\n10 most violent states in the country. If human rights
\nviolations are to be stopped, this democratic exercise might not be the entire
\nsolution, but it is definitely a critical starting point.\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"