While families across the country celebrated Mother’s Day Monday, mothers of missing children marched in cities around the country to demand justice.
Carrying signs reading “Because they were taken from us alive, we want them back alive” and “Son, listen, your mother is in the battle,” women from at least 74 collectives walked in Mexico City from the Angel of Independence to the Monument to the Revolution, for the 10th annual March for National Dignity.
In front of the National Palace they were attended by Interior Minister Olga Sánchez Cordero, and Deputy Minister of Human Rights Alejandro Encinas.
Mothers showed photographs of their disappeared children, many wearing t-shirts bearing images of their faces. At the Glorieta de la Palma intersection some read out the names of the missing.
“… mothers searching for their family members cannot celebrate this May 10, there won’t be any hugs, laughs or gifts,” one woman said.
“Today I’m here, not celebrating my May 10, I’m telling the president of the republic that I want my son back alive,” said María Guadalupe Rodríguez Narciso, mother of Josué Molina Rodríguez, who disappeared in 2014 in Chilpancingo, Guerrero.
Ana Luisa Romo Díaz, whose son disappeared in Torreón, Coahuila, in 2010, criticized President López Obrador for inaction. “The president needs to stop the nonsense and, as he promised” put the government to work searching for the missing, adding that he has turned his back on families of the missing since he took office.
Sonia Hernández Camacho’s son disappeared nine months ago in Veracruz after he went with his partner to Mexico City to sell a vehicle. Although his partner was released to recount what happened she claimed that neither federal nor state authorities have attempted to search for her son.
“We gave a lot of evidence for them to search for him alive after his partner came and gave all the necessary information for his immediate search, and they didn’t do it,” she said.
