The visitor center near the Palenque archaeological site in Chiapas is 55% complete, said the Culture Ministry. INAH
Visitor centers are now under construction at some of the archaeological sites located near the route of the Maya Train railroad.
Chichén Itzá, Uxmal and Ek’ Balam in Yucatán and Palenque in Chiapas are among the sites that will get Visitor Attention Centers (known collectively as “CATVIs”), according to a statement published Monday by the Ministry of Culture.
The National Institute of Anthropology and History is supervising the construction of the centers, which are slated to enhance the experiences of archaeological site visitors, including Maya Train passengers who disembark to visit ancient Mayan cities in the five states — Tabasco, Campeche, Yucatán, Quintana Roo and Chiapas — through which the 1,500-kilometer railroad will run.
The US $10 billion railroad is expected to begin operations in 2023.
The ancient Maya site of Palenque, known for its extensive hieroglyphics, is one of the more popular pre-Hispanic sites in Mexico. INAH
In its statement, the Culture Ministry provided an update on the construction of the Palenque archaeological site’s CATVI, located about nine kilometers from the town of Palenque, Chiapas. The center — which is being built three kilometers from the ancient city — is 55% complete, the ministry said.
The site where the center is being built was excavated between 1990 and 2000 and inspected again for ancient artifacts in 2021 before construction began. Carlos Varela Scherrer, a Palenque archaeological site official, said that last year’s inspection turned up just 40 ceramic shards, confirming that “there wasn’t an intense occupation of the area.”
Citing representatives from the private consortium building the Palenque-Escárcega stretch (Section 1) of the Maya Train railroad, the Culture Ministry said that the centers’ objective is to “optimize the visitor experience and to serve as development hubs for nearby communities.”
Juan Ignacio Roldán Suárez, chief engineer for the section 1 project, said that the Palenque CATVI will function as a “filter” for the archaeological area, a place where tourists can rest before and after visiting the ancient city.
The visitor center will feature solar panels on the roof.
The center’s design, inspired by traditional Mayan homes, will have parking for cars and buses, an “introductory module,” drinking fountains and washrooms that “converge at a Mayan arch,” the Culture Ministry said.
It also said the CATVI will be a sustainable building, noting that it will have its own water treatment plant and that its palm-leaf roof will have solar panels.
“With the support of biologists, we’ll create wildlife crossings and we’ll make sure that animals are not affected by power lines, bright lights or excessive noise,” Roldán Suárez said.
Over 100 residents of Palenque and nearby communities are working directly and indirectly in the construction of the CATVI, the Culture Ministry said. Palenque already has a site museum, where visitors can learn about the pre-Hispanic settlement and the Mayan people who occupied it.
A burned out bus in Zapopan, Jalisco, set alight by armed criminals. @ahtziricardenas/Twitter
An operation to arrest a Jalisco New Generation Cartel (CJNG) leader triggered a violent response in Jalisco and Guanajuato on Tuesday, where at least a dozen vehicles and businesses were set on fire.
Carried out by the army and the National Guard in the metropolitan area of Guadalajara, the operation reportedly succeeded in detaining Ricardo Ruiz Velasco, a presumed CJNG plaza chief in western Mexico and the Bajío region.
According to a Reforma newspaper report, the violence began at approximately 7:30 p.m. when a group of armed men seized three public transit buses and two private vehicles in Zapopan, a municipality that adjoins Guadalajara. They subsequently set the vehicles alight to create fiery narco-blockades.
Jalisco Governor Enrique Alfaro reported on Twitter that there was a confrontation between the army and organized crime members in the area where the municipalities of Ixtlahuacán del Río and Cuquío meet. In an attempt to block the passage of security forces, vehicles were set alight on the highway to Saltillo, he said. “Fortunately, there are no injured persons. The situation is under control,” Alfaro wrote.
After Ricardo Ruiz Velasco’s arrest, criminal groups began setting fires in Zapopan.
The violent response to the arrest of Ruiz – who has previously been identified as a leader of a CJNG elite group – spread to the neighboring state of Guanajuato later on Tuesday night. Armed men set vehicles and businesses on fire in the municipalities of Celaya, Irapuato, Salamanca, Silao and Apaseo el Grande, according to a Milenio newspaper report. Reforma reported that public transit vehicles and convenience stores were also torched in León and Guanajuato city.
Irapuato, a city known as Mexico’s strawberry capital, bore the brunt of the backlash, according to Reforma, with at least a dozen stores and a gas station set alight. More narco-blockades were created by setting vehicles on fire on the highway between Celaya and Apaseo el Grande.
Guanajuato Governance Minister Libia García said that the violence in that state was related to the events in Jalisco. In a Twitter post, she also said that some of the aggressors involved in setting vehicles and businesses on fire had been detained.
“The criminal action is contained and under control, there are no injured persons,” García wrote.
This video posted on Twitter shows a person driving through Irapuato while cars were on fire Tuesday night.
Known as “El Doble R” (The Double R), Ruiz is a central figure in the CJNG, according to a report by news website Publimetro. It was reported in 2020 that Ruiz and another key cartel lieutenant could challenge the leadership of Nemesio “El Mencho” Oseguera Cervantes, who is rumored to have kidney problems. However, two years later Oseguera remains at the helm of the CJNG, which is believed to operate in 28 states across Mexico.
According to Publimetro, Ruiz was wanted in connection with the 2012 murder of Venezuelan model Daisy Ferrer and the 2013 homicide of former Jalisco tourism minister José de Jesús Gallegos Álvarez.
Two of the Danzante stones at Monte Albán, which were probably carved by the Olmecs, the city's first occupants. Photos by Joseph Sorrentino
The Monte Albán ruins sit majestically on a flattened hilltop in the Valley of Oaxaca, about 9 kilometers (5.5 miles) west of the city of Oaxaca. The site on which it stands has been occupied for over 1,500 years by various groups; first Olmecs and then the Zapotecs and Mixtecs.
The Zapotecs built the city, which for over 1,000 years was one of the most important in all of Mesoamerica. But despite its importance, no one today knows what its Zapotecan name was.
Several possibilities have been put forward, including Colina de Jaguar (Jaguar Hill), Montaña Sagrada (Sacred Hill) or Cerro del Tigre (Tiger Hill). And it’s not clear where the name Monte Albán came from either.
It may have been the name of a Spanish soldier, or it may refer to the Alban Hills in Italy, although why it would be named for some Italian hills is a mystery. It’s also thought that Monte Albán may be a corruption of the original Zapotecan name.
Monte Albán’s elegant and well preserved ball court.
Olmecs were the first to occupy the site and may have carved some of the stones known as Los Danzantes (The Dancers). At the very least, that civilization influenced their depictions, since some of the faces have distinctive Olmec traits, such as large heads and thick lips (more about these intriguing stones later).
It’s generally agreed that the Zapotecs arrived around 500 B.C. At that time, another Zapotec city now known as San José Mogote was the largest city in the valley. It’s believed that rulers from there decided to build a new capital on top of a hill primarily for defensive reasons — the period was characterized by ongoing warfare, and locating a city on top of a hill would certainly provide more security.
At its start, the city covered about 800 acres and had an initial population of about 5,000.
Between 500 and 150 B.C., the city grew to cover 1,092 acres, and its population expanded to about 17,000. This explosive growth is believed to be due to the relocation of residents from San José Mogote which, along with other sites in the valley, showed a rapid decline in population.
The city’s population continued to grow, reaching its peak of 35,000 between A.D. 250 and 500. It appears that the city’s center was reserved for the ruling elites while the bulk of the population lived outside the center, where they grew crops on terraces.
The city began a slow decline around A.D. 500. Then, for reasons still unknown, it collapsed completely between A.D. 850 and 900. It was then occupied sporadically by other groups, most notably Mixtecs.
Monte Alban’s spectacular Main Plaza, which measures 300 by 200 meters, has pyramids, a palace, an observatory, at least 170 tombs and large slabs covered with hieroglyphics. Along its periphery are buildings believed to have been temples and which also housed the ruling elites and priests. There are two well-preserved ballcourts on which a game called tlachtli was played. Its architecture, ceramics and murals show the influence of Teotihuacán, a major urban center located about 500 miles directly north in what is now the state of México.
One of the most interesting buildings is the boringly-named Building J, which was constructed around 100 B.C. It’s shaped like an arrow, something unique in Monte Albán, and most archeologists believe it was an observatory. In addition, the site was also where Monte Albán’s rulers announced their victories over neighboring groups.
This slab is one of more than 40 similar stones with writing that may represent areas conquered by Monte Albán. The upside down figure may show sacrificed captives.
Along its sides are more than 40 carved stones with the names of different places. Many also have upside-down heads and additional writing. It’s believed that the names refer to areas conquered by Monte Albán. The upside-down heads may represent sacrificed captives.
The carved stones known as Los Danzantes are located outside Building L. Over 300 of them depict naked men, some with their genitals appearing to be mutilated. Carved between 350 and 200 B.C., they are called The Dancers because their convoluted shapes led researchers to believe that the figures depict dancers. That theory, however, has been rejected.
Although it’s now generally believed that they depict tortured and sacrificed war captives, some of whom are identified by name, a 2019 paper offers a radically different explanation: instead of sacrificed captives, it argues that the carvings depict the city’s elites in positions mimicking those of jaguars. If so, this would suggest that the stones were carved not by the Olmecs but by the Zapotecs.
In Zapotecan culture, the jaguar represented the land and fecundity, and its roar was believed to be the voice of the mountains. In Monte Albán, the jaguar was revered as the city’s guardian god. Researcher Fahmel Beyer also argues that the figures don’t display genital mutilation. Rather, he believes that the area’s covered with a flower glyph, which represents a sex organ.
Monte Albán was named a World Heritage site by UNESCO in 1987. Currently, a little over 5,100 acres of it are protected land. An agreement between Mexico’s National Institute of Anthropology and History (INAH) and the municipality of Oaxaca city in 1993 gives INAH the power to control any proposed development in and around the site and allows for archeological investigations.
The fastest way to get to Monte Albán is by car or taxi. A taxi will run 140 to 180 pesos (US $7 or $8). There are also buses that cost about 8 pesos, but the trip takes much longer and the buses tend to be packed. The entrance fee is a modest 85 pesos.
The site is open every day from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. Like many ruins across Mexico, there’s precious little shade, so sunscreen and a good sun hat are must-haves. And water. Once past the entrance, there’s none to be had.
Figure about two hours to leisurely explore the ruins. The museum is currently closed, but you can grab a drink and a snack in the restaurant and pick up some souvenirs in the gift shop.
Entrepreneur Luis Oswaldo Espinoza Marín killed himself while authorities raided his Zapopan property on Saturday. Video capture
A businessman who committed suicide during a police raid on his Jalisco home on Saturday fleeced hundreds if not thousands of people by using celebrities to seal his credibility.
After recording a mea culpa video, Luis Oswaldo Espinoza Marín shot himself in the head during a state police raid on his property in Zapopan, part of the metropolitan area of Guadalajara. The police were seeking to arrest Espinoza after some 130 fraud complaints were filed against him.
The businessman operated the real estate company Asesores Jurídicos Profesionales (AJP) for 30 years, during which time he purchased old, run-down homes and renovated them before selling them at a healthy profit.
According to a report by the newspaper Mural, Espinoza used his supposed relationships with political figures, celebrities and sports stars to convince people he could be trusted. He also had a way with words, using persuasive language to cajole people into investing their hard-earned cash in his company. AJP was supposed to pay monthly returns to investors, but those payments stopped earlier this year, according to one defrauded person.
Espinoza, left, used this picture to convince potential investors that he was close to boxer Saul ‘Canelo’ Álvarez. This is actually a picture of Espinoza with one of Álvarez’s brothers.
Mural reported Tuesday that over 200 complaints have now been filed against Espinoza, adding that state authorities estimate that investors’ losses could amount to some 250 million pesos (US $12.3 million). El Universal reported that there could be as many as 10,000 fraud victims.
One victim, Marisol Sandoval, says Espinoza swindled her to the tune of 550,000 pesos (US $27,100). She told Mural that the entrepreneur showed her photos of him with famous people when she was considering investing in AJP. His aim, Sandoval said, was to get potential clients to trust him, and in her case, the tactic worked.
“You say to yourself, ‘How could he defraud [champion boxer Saúl] ‘Canelo’ [Álvarez]? How could he defraud [government official and television presenter] Eli Castro?” she said.
Sandoval said she was offered a return of 2% if she invested for six months, 2.5% for nine months and 3% for a one-year investment. The minimum investment was 100,000 pesos (almost US $5,000), while some people entrusted millions to Espinoza’s company, she said.
In addition to using his supposed links to famous, rich and powerful people to seal deals with investors, Espinoza showed them property deeds to convince investors that they could entrust their money to AJP, according to Eduardo Sherman, a lawyer for three victims.
“He convinced them by providing them with the guarantee from the deeds of three properties,” he said, adding that one of the deeds corresponded to the Zapopan property where Espinoza took his own life.
Sherman called on Jalisco authorities to act quickly to trace Espinoza’s monetary transfers during his time at the helm of AJP.
Another victim – identified only as Fidel by Mural – said he lost 2 million pesos (US $98,700). He said he decided to invest in Espinoza’s company 1 1/2 years ago and everything went as expected in the beginning.
Celebrities were not only used to convince investors of Espinoza’s credibility, some were also victims, including singer Christian Nodal.
“There were people who spoke well about the company and that’s why we made an investment. … It appeared to be a good, serious company. ”
However, Fidel’s monthly interest payments suddenly stopped in May. “[The company] told us ‘we have a problem, wait until next month or next week,’ that kind of thing,” he said.
Fidel said he has lost his life savings and that he needs the money in order to keep his business afloat. Another victim – a long-term neighbor of Espinoza – said she felt angry and disappointed about being swindled of an undisclosed amount of money.
“I can’t believe that a person is capable of putting together such a terrible thing,” Araceli said.
Marisol, Fidel and Araceli were among some 50 people who protested outside Jalisco government offices on Monday to seek the intervention of Governor Enrique Alfaro in the case.
Alfaro, who spoke with some of the victims, said the matter was “between private individuals” and one in which the government has no involvement, but stressed that state authorities want to assist the process “so that the work of the Attorney General’s Office can be very clear and punctual.”
Before taking his own life, Espinoza recorded a video message in which he said he was unable to service loans he had taken out due to the “disruptive” nature of the pandemic.
“I over-mortgaged the properties that I purchased with the fruit of your investments,” he said in the video he posted to his Facebook account just before the police arrived and he killed himself. The businessman said that he made all required payments to investors for 29 years before running into trouble.
Espinoza, center background in white, used his involvement in an organ transplant charity linked with celebrities to obtain photos of himself with them to seal his credibility with potential investors.
“I am currently unable to go on,” Espinoza said, adding that all of the money his company received from investors is invested in mortgaged real estate. He took full responsibility for defrauding investors and apologized to them, his family and his colleagues.
“None of my relatives or colleagues or my wife and kids … used resources fraudulently. I ask for their forgiveness as well as that of my clients,” Espinoza said.
“The guilty party, in an ethical, civil, criminal and historic sense, is me,” he said before asking that there be no reprisals against innocent people.
“… Currently I can’t go on, not even with my life,” Espinoza reiterated. “The last six months of my life, I’ve felt emotionally, physically and morally destroyed. I’ve lost everything. Don’t hold anyone responsible for my death.”
Diego Toj, advocate for the Mam language and culture.
The number of speakers of a Mayan language known as Mam declined by about 50% between 2005 and 2020, leading to fears that the language and culture could die out in southern Mexico.
The 2005 census counted over 19,000 speakers of Mam but the number had declined to just 9,800 by 2020.
The language is spoken in 14 municipalities near the border with Guatemala in the southern state of Chiapas, according to a report by the newspaper Diario del Sur. Among them are Unión Juárez, Tapachula, Huehuetán and Amatenango de la Frontera.
Diego Toj, a member of the Maya-Mam Regional Indigenous Council, told Diario del Sur that efforts to preserve the Mam language have been limited to grandfathers, grandmothers and bilingual teachers. But they don’t have educational materials to support their efforts or adequate spaces in which to teach, he said, adding that they are not remunerated for their work.
Toj said there is scant interest from Mexican authorities to preserve the Mam culture and language, which is spoken more widely in Guatemala. That lack of interest as well as the migration of young people to central Mexico and the United States are factors that have put the language, gastronomy, herbal medicine, ceremonies and rituals and culture generally at risk of extinction, he said.
Toj said that authorities need to provide resources to ensure their conservation, noting that neither the federal nor the Chiapas government has allocated funds to that end for years.
The Mam people, who live in the Soconusco and Sierra Mariscal regions of Chiapas, and other indigenous groups need more than good intentions, the council member said, asserting that investment in healthcare and basic infrastructure such as roads is also needed.
José Castañón Ramírez, a Mam teacher, told Diario del Sur that authorities have announced programs to “rescue” indigenous languages and culture, but they haven’t reached Mam communities in southern Chiapas. He acknowledged the existence of authorities such as the National Institute of Indigenous Peoples (INPI) and National Institute of Indigenous Languages (INALI), but complained that there is no on-the-ground support from them.
Irma Pineda, Mexico’s representative to the United Nations Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues said earlier this year that a proposal to incorporate INALI into INPI showed that protecting native tongues is not a priority for the federal government.
Similarly, Castañón said it was regrettable that the current federal government doesn’t provide sufficient support to indigenous communities – even though President López Obrador styles himself as a champion of Mexico’s most marginalized and impoverished people.
Competitors both young and elderly running in a tortilla-carrying race that's a nearly 30-year tradition in Tehuacán, Puebla. Twitter
A much-awaited tortilla race returned to a Puebla city on Sunday with runners raring to go after two years of cancellations due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
More than 300 indigenous women of all ages from Santa María Coapan convened at the municipal palace in nearby Tehuacán at 9 a.m. with stacks of tortillas at the ready for the 28th edition of the famous race.
Adorned with aprons, traditional embroidered blouses, leather huarache sandals and woven baskets full of corn tortillas, the runners lined up to tackle the 4.5 kilometer course. Some ran barefoot.
Different races were held for various age categories, which included youth, veteran and an open category. The children’s race kicked off proceedings, and some of the young competitors set off at full pelt, only to quickly hit a wall of dehydration which forced them to slow to a more comfortable pace.
In one video of the races, women are seen at the starting line in traditional dress singing together. They hear the buzzer and speed off, carrying large bags of tortillas on their backs, some weighing 6 kilograms, the newspaper El Universal said.
The race, celebrated every August 7, pays tribute to the journey that the women of Santa María Coapan traditionally have taken for years from their town to Tehuacán, where they sell their tortillas at Tehuacán’s public market. In 2017, the race was officially named part of the cultural heritage of Tehuacán.
Fernando Ríos Rocha, head of the state’s office of plastic arts and cultural development, said that the race was a symbolic one that reinforced Puebla’s traditions.
However, the race was not all that symbolic to many of the competitors. Several took to the contest like ducks to water, saying they were accustomed to carrying a heavy load of tortillas for sale in baskets every morning; some support their entire families with their sales.
📍👥Antes de iniciar la Carrera de la Tortillas, las participantes llevan a cabo un ritual prehispánico en Coapan pic.twitter.com/eiapYcaq1N
Before the race’s start, competitors underwent a pre-Hispanic ritual
One runner, Nayeli Morales de Jesús, said she started making and selling tortillas when she was 10 years old. Morales joined her first race four years ago. She told the news site E-Consulta that her tortillas have reached Colombia, Spain and Germany and urged authorities in Tehuacán to help support food and tortilla sellers in Santa María Coapan.
The victor in the children’s category, Luz Janet de Jesús Muñoz, carried three kilograms in her basket. María de los Ángeles Zamora Leal again took the crown in the free category, having won the last edition in 2019.
Lots of trash, brought partly by tourism are creating scenes like this in Mazatlán: municipal workers pull trash out of a city drainage system that damaged pumps.
Mass tourism is causing pollution problems in Mazatlán, triggering calls for a greater focus on sustainable tourism in the Pacific coast resort city.
Some 677,000 tourists are expected to visit the Sinaloa beach destination during the summer vacation period of July and August, according to the newspaper El Sol de Mazatlán, which also reported that 800,000 visitors flocked to the city in Holy Week, a figure that easily exceeds Mazatlán’s population of approximately 500,000. In addition, Mazatlan is expected to see three times as many cruise ships visit this year than in 2021.
Mayor Luis Guillermo Benítez Torres acknowledged last week that Mazatlán is swamped with tourists, but asserted that is a good thing given the benefits tourism brings to the local economy.
“In Mazatlán there are vacations practically the whole year. … You have to line up for about two hours to enjoy breakfast in a restaurant because fortunately everything is saturated,” he said last Tuesday.
Blanca Roldán, a Mazatlán-based academic who specializes in issues related to the environment and development, agreed that tourism is good for Mazatlán from an economic standpoint, but highlighted that the massive influx of visitors also has negative consequences.
Mayor Luis Guillermo Benítez Torres, seen here speaking at a UN-Habitat forum on sustainable urbanization, says being inundated with tourists is good for the economy. Twitter
“The contamination problem is undoubtedly increasing,” she told El Sol de Mazatlán. Roldán said that the accumulation of waste, as well as noise and visual pollution, are tourism-related problems in the city known as the “Pearl of the Pacific.”
“The most common [form of pollution], or that which citizens notice the most, is that generated by trash, especially on the coast and in public places,” she said.
Roldán said that nightclubs and bars as well as public transport and tourism-related construction projects all contribute to noise pollution in Mazatlán, while construction projects also cause visual pollution.
“The construction of extremely high towers doesn’t just break the harmony of the landscape, but has also blocked … the view to the sea of some residents,” Roldán said. The academic also said that real estate development destroys native vegetation, and causes other damage to the environment.
Continual construction, especially of skyscrapers, is contributing to visual and noise pollution, as well as making higher demands on the city’s resources.
“This type of urban development is not sustainable, not just for the environment but also for residents,” she said.
Roldán told El Sol de Mazatlán that an increased focus on sustainable tourism is urgently needed.
“Sustainable tourism is that which should be maintained, … [tourism that] doesn’t [adversely] affect communities, local citizens and natural resources,” she said.
“The characteristic of this kind of tourism is respect for the environment – [tourism activities] carried out with minimal impact in natural areas while creating environmental awareness among visitors,” Roldán said.
In 2021, Mazatlán partnered with Corona beer in a plastic trash “fishing” competition. The winner collected 319 kilograms off the coast of one beach.
She said that there are very few bona fide sustainable tourism and ecotourism activities on offer, explaining that the number of people participating in excursions in natural areas often exceeds the capacity of the environment in which they take place.
“Sustainable tourism has to be related to the local context, its culture, flora and fauna. [It’s about] having an experience with natural resources in a respectful way,” Roldán said, adding that tour guides have an important role to play because they need to tell tourists what they can and can’t do to avoid harm to the environment.
The current lack of focus on alternative tourism activities – such as tours on nature trails and bird-watching excursions – appears to be related to a lack of demand for them. Roldán said that most tourists come to Mazatlán to spend time at the beach, drink alcohol and listen to banda music.
“Tourism is mainly domestic,” she said, adding that visitors generally don’t have very high levels of education. “That doesn’t mean they don’t have a certain status [due to] their purchasing power,” Roldán said.
Mazatlán is known for its beach resorts, but areas like Deer Island offer possibilities for sustainable tourist activities like hiking and birdwatching. Twitter
In order for sustainable tourism to become more prevalent in Mazatlán, “environmental awareness” among tourists, tourism operators and hoteliers is needed, she said, adding that political and business will is also required.
“But it’s not something that is easy [to achieve]. The business objective in tourism is to have profits,” Roldán said.
Another person who would like to see a broader range of tourism activities in Mazatlán is Juan Jaquez, a seasoned traveler and ecologist from Gómez Palacio, Durango.
“As a visitor, I see very little alternative tourism [activities] on offer, … [things] that aren’t limited to beach, sun and sand,” he told El Sol de Mazatlán. “In other destinations, they bet more on attractions such as hiking, cycling and forest walks, among other things,” Jaquez said.
Like Roldán, the 28-year-old ecologist advocated a greater focus on sustainable tourism to reduce the negative impact visitors have on the local environment. Jaquez, who has traveled to Mazatlán on several occasions, said he has noticed pollution problems in the city, including issues related to the poor management of wastewater and trash. The influx of tourists in certain periods of the year – such as summer – only exacerbates the problems.
But Jaquez believes that offering more sustainable tourism activities could ease the pressure that tourists exert.
“The beaches are the best attraction in Mazatlán, but there are also tourists who … want to do other kinds of activities that are friendlier to the environment. The port [city] has the potential to provide that … because it has important natural areas. It’s time to start taking advantage of them,” he said.
The National Guard, which replaced the federal police in 2019, is the responsibility of the Security Ministry but operates under army leadership on the ground. (File photo)
President López Obrador has announced he will issue a decree to put the National Guard under the control of the army, a move that opposition lawmakers and others described as unconstitutional.
Created by the current federal government and inaugurated in 2019, the National Guard is currently the responsibility of the Security Ministry (SSPC), although it operates under army leadership on the ground.
Speaking at his regular news conference on Monday, López Obrador said he would issue an “agreement” allowing the National Guard to completely depend on the Ministry of National Defense (Sedena), a move that would change the security force’s essential nature from civilian to military.
“I want the Defense Ministry to take charge,” he told reporters. “… If it’s necessary I can modify the internal regulations of the government – it can be by decree.”
The president announced his intention to administratively transfer control of the National Guard at his Monday press conference.
Transferring responsibility for the National Guard to Sedena by decree would bypass Congress – whose members established the security force under civilian command – but López Obrador said he would also send a proposed constitutional reform to the legislature. However, he claimed his decree would be binding even if the proposed reform doesn’t pass.
“We’re going to seek the way [to transfer the National Guard to Sedena] … administratively,” he said, emphasizing that his decree would ensure the army remains in charge of the security force no matter what the nation’s lawmakers decide.
Probed as to why he was bothering to send an initiative to Congress if he can make the desired change himself, López Obrador said he wanted to enshrine it in the constitution so that it’s not reversed later, although it appears unlikely he can get enough support to do that.
Asked whether his proposed decree was the “democratic way” forward, López Obrador responded:
“Yes, because if it isn’t I’m violating the constitution, which I’ll never do. There is no problem, but I have to use the legal margins … to make progress.”
The president – whose six-year term is on track to be the most violent in recent decades – added that his government’s agenda is stifled by an “opposition bloc that doesn’t help at all,” asserting that it rejects “everything that benefits the people.”
In early 2019, then-security minister Alfonso Durazo said that López Obrador had taken on board the different opinions about the leadership of the national guard, and Durazo asked lawmakers to modify the original proposal in order to create a national guard with a civilian command but with the same levels of discipline and training as the armed forces.
The Mexican federal police force was officially dissolved at the end of 2019, after the formation of the National Guard.
The then-minister said in January 2019 that the new force would be the responsibility of the SSPC, not Sedena as previously proposed.
While the National Guard was placed under civilian command, López Obrador has depended on the military for a range of non-traditional tasks, including public security, infrastructure construction and management of the nation’s ports and customs offices.
In May 2020, he published a decree ordering the armed forces to continue carrying out public security tasks for another four years, even though he had promised a gradual withdrawal of the military from the nation’s streets. His proposed National Guard/Sedena decree would take things a step further: it would ensure the government’s public security efforts are under a single command and seemingly guarantee that what is already a quasi-militarized security force will become a fully-militarized one.
Contradicting López Obrador’s claim, non-government lawmakers, analysts and others asserted that the president doesn’t have the authority to reassign responsibility for the National Guard to Sedena. For that to occur, the constitution must be changed, they argued, and such reforms require the support of two-thirds of lawmakers. But the ruling Morena party and its allies don’t have a supermajority in either the Chamber of Deputies or the Senate.
Jorge Álvarez Máynez, leader of the Citizens Movement party in the lower house of Congress, said the decree López Obrador announced on Monday is “a blow to the constitution.”
“There is no space for half measures in the face of constitutional coup plotting,” he wrote on Twitter. “If a public servant is incapable of defending the constitution, he has no business in the public service.”
Damián Zepeda, a National Action Party (PAN) senator, bluntly said that López Obrador’s proposed decree is “unconstitutional and militarizes the country.”
“The constitution says the National Guard is CIVILIAN,” he wrote on Twitter. “[López Obrador] doesn’t have the votes [in Congress] and is imposing an illegal agreement. It will be challenged and left in the hands of the Supreme Court. Do you now see the importance of his [Supreme Court] appointments?”
La Guardia Nacional NO puede depender de @SEDENAmx.
La Constitución establece que la Guardia es una institución de civil que estará adscrita a la @SSPCMexico.
On Twitter, Javier Martín Reyes, a prominent UNAM academic, shared the section of the Constitution that establishes the National Guard as a civil rather than military organization.
Margarita Zavala, a PAN deputy and former first lady, was among numerous other politicians who spoke out against the president’s announcement.
“… Lawmakers of all parliamentary groups should come out in defense of the constitution and Congress,” she wrote on Twitter.
Security analyst Alejandro Hope and political scientist Javier Martín Reyes were among other observers who asserted that López Obrador doesn’t have the authority to transfer the National Guard to Sedena by decree.
“The National Guard cannot depend on Sedena. The constitution establishes that the Guard is a civilian institute assigned to the SSPC. Although López Obrador doesn’t like it, a decree cannot alter what the constitution says with complete clarity,” Martín said.
Catalina Pérez Correa, a researcher at the Center for Research and Teaching in Economics, said that the president had announced “without subterfuge” that he was going to “continue violating the constitution.”
“If the Supreme Court is going to continue allowing the president to flagrantly violate the constitution, if López Obrador is above the law and not obliged to respect the law, why do [everyday] citizens have to do it?” she asked.
The St. Patrick's Batallion was mostly made up of Irish immigrant soldiers who deserted the U.S. army after experiencing harsh discrimination. Library of Congress.
As Mexican president and general Antonio López de Santa Anna’s army retreats from the Battle of Buena Vista during the Mexican-American War, an unlikely Mexican hero struggles to keep up the pace: Irish-American officer John Riley.
Riley, an immigrant to the United States who served in his adopted country’s army against Mexico on the Rio Grande, commanded the Batalión San Patricio, a Mexican battalion composed of European, mostly Irish, soldiers who had tired of the discrimination they experienced in the U.S. ranks and deserted to fight for Mexico.
Riley is a main character in a new historical novel by Reyna Grande, A Ballad of Love and Glory, which centers on the real-life character of Riley and his fictional partner, Ximena.
“I became really fascinated with John Riley,” Grande said. “I started to wonder, why did he do it? Who was he? What was driving him? Why did he want to help Mexico? So once I started asking all these questions, the wheels started turning for me.”
A bust of Riley in Mexico CIty.
Grande has extensive experience chronicling life on both sides of the border: born in Iguala, Guerrero, she entered the United States as an undocumented immigrant at age nine. She went on to attend a university — the first in her family to do so — and to join the Macondo Writer’s Workshop, founded by prominent Latina author Sandra Cisneros.
In 2012, Grande wrote a bestselling, acclaimed memoir about her childhood experiences, The Distance Between Us. Since then, she has published a young readers’ version of the book, as well as a sequel, A Dream Called Home. She calls A Ballad of Love and Glory both “different and similar” to her previous books.
“The genre is different — it’s my first historical fiction,” she said. “I had never written about war, about battles.”
Yet, she noted, “I explored the immigrant experience again. This time, I was working with the Irish experience of the 19th century. There were so many similarities between the Irish experience and the Latino experience today. I drew a lot from my own immigrant experience to be able to write about John Riley.”
In the novel, John has left his wife and son back in Ireland to try to improve his life in the U.S. and eventually bring his family over. Yet, the American army treats Irish immigrant soldiers harshly, while the Mexican army covertly sends them offers of better treatment and reminders of their shared Catholic faith. Riley ends up joining those who swim across the Rio Grande to switch sides.
The inspiration for Ximena’s character, meanwhile, came from an 1847 poem by John Greenleaf Whittier, “The Angels of Buena Vista.” The poem features a soldadera named Ximena as its protagonist, and it opens Grande’s book.
“When I found his poem, I decided to make Ximena my female lead in the book,” Grande said. “I did not really know anything about Ximena except the poem — she was on the battlefield, tending to the wounded. I had to create her from scratch.”
On the arduous retreat to San Luis Potosí, for example, the Mexican army faces both hunger and thirst. Ximena Salome, a Mexican widow and army nurse, uses her invaluable skills as a curandera to help Riley: she chops up a nopal to purify water and feeds him cactus pulp, chia seeds and yucca petals.
Reyna Grande, who was born in Guerrero, used some of her experiences as a child immigrant to the U.S. to inspire the story of A Ballad of Love and Glory. Reyna Grande
Grande gave Ximena a backstory with roots in San Antonio de Bexar, back when Texas was part of Mexico. Ximena’s family sided with the Anglos against the Mexicans during the Texas Revolution, yet nevertheless, when the narrative begins, Ximena has lost her home in Texas and has had to relocate south of the Rio Grande. There, she rides horses with her husband and learns about healing from her grandmother, a curandera.
These details are a poignant tribute to the author’s late grandmother, who was also a curandera.
“When I was a little girl, I often watched her doing limpias [cleansing rituals], stuff like that,” Grande said. “I have memories of my grandmother practicing curanderismo.” She added that the scenes between Ximena and her abuela (grandmother) are an imaginary “relationship I might have had with my grandmother.”
After the outbreak of the Mexican-American War, Ximena’s hacienda becomes a target of the Texas Rangers, and her husband dies in the attack. Seeking revenge, she becomes a nurse in the Mexican army, where she meets Riley.
A memorable, passionate love story develops between them, reflected in conversations punctuated with John’s Irish brogue and Ximena’s Mexican accent. One such exchange takes place when John fears that all is lost on the retreat from Buena Vista. “Don’t give up on me, you hear?’ he pleads. “Don’t leave me to the buzzards.”
She replies, “¡Nunca [never]! I will not leave you behind, soldier.”
Ximena’s Texas background also means that she is familiar with Santa Anna. Although the novel presents him as able to inspire the army to go into battle, it also shows an unsavory side.
“Based on everything I read about him, reading his proclamations, I felt he was a very complex and complicated man,” Grande said. “He was charismatic but also a womanizer, a flirt.”
Grande’s book is both a war novel and a love story embedded in a piece of history that for many decades, the U.S. government did not acknowledge happened. Reyna Grande
The book even depicts Santa Anna’s love of cockfighting, which he expresses to both Ximena and John at various points.
“To me, the cockfighting also turns into a metaphor in the book,” Grande said, citing an exchange in the book between John and a fellow San Patricio soldier. “John Riley turns to Patrick Dalton and says there’s a fine line between bravery and foolishness, talking about the cocks and why they fight to the death.”
“I think it’s mostly male readers who are liking the book,” Grande reflected. “They like the battles, they like the politics. They like that the book is a war story with a love story, that the love story doesn’t dominate the narrative, whereas female readers, I think, they wanted more love, less war.”
The war narrative contains a grim chapter. Although the San Patricios performed valiantly, many were captured by the U.S. military after the Battle of Churubusco, a battle which the U.S. general Ulysses S. Grant once said was one of the hardest of the war to win.
In real life, the captured San Patricio soldiers were court-martialed by the U.S. for treason. Fifty were executed. While Riley’s life was spared, he was whipped and branded.
His life after the war is unknown to history, according to the author. “Nobody knows what happened to him,” she said. “Once he was discharged from the Mexican army, he disappeared from the military records. People don’t really know what happened.”
So the author came up with her own ending to the story of John and Ximena. “It was up to me to give him an ending,” she said.
But what of Riley’s unit?
The St. Patrick’s Battalion was honored by the Mexican government for their role in the war in 1959. Around 80 members were eventually captured by U.S. forces in August of 1847.
“For a long time, the U.S. government denied the existence of the St. Patrick’s Battalion. It was not until recent decades when they finally released the records, the official military records, especially of the courts-martial.”
“In Mexico, it’s different. In Mexico, they’re still considered as the Irish heroes.”
Rich Tenorio is a frequent contributor to Mexico News Daily.
Business owners are left with few options in Zihuatanejo: shut down or pay.
Building supplies outlets in Zihuatanejo, Guerrero, have been forced to close after becoming the latest victims of extortion and threats from criminal groups, which have also affected tortillerías and public transport.
A hotel owner from the Guerrero city, who asked to remain anonymous for security reasons, said that at least five building supplies outlets closed last week after criminal groups demanded extortion money.
“What we know is that they are being charged [extortion] and that payments are being demanded of them. That’s why they closed,” the hotel owner said in interview with the newspaper El Universal. He added that criminal groups demanded extortion payments from hotel owners a few months ago, but hadn’t attempted to do so again more recently.
One building supplies store, Materiales Ixtapa (Ixtapa Materials), wrote on social media to announce its closure. “Dear customers, we thank you for your preference, our installations will remain closed temporarily due to security issues. We apologize for the inconvenience,” it said in a post.
Extortion has become commonplace in Zihuatanejo: more than 50 tortillerías closed temporarily in May due to threats and public transport was also temporarily suspended.
Criminal groups demanded a payment for the right to make tortillas, which tortilla makers rejected, instead closing as a means of security and protest. Around the same time, half the city’s transport services were suspended in protest after three transport vehicles were set alight by armed men.
“If you don’t want them to do anything to you, you pay every day,” a transport provider said at the time.
Transport workers face dangerous conditions to move people from A to B in the state: 24 public transit drivers and two transport association leaders have been murdered in Guerrero during the past four months, according to a count by the Milenio newspaper.
Governor Evelyn Salgado denied rumors that transport workers agreed to a deal with criminals for transport services to resume.
A Zihuatanejo resident previously told El Universal that business owners were left with few options. “Here, that’s how simple it is. If you don’t pay quickly, they’ll want to burn your business down,” the resident said, adding that criminals were attempting to control sales of beer, soft drinks and meat and that almost all service providers were being extorted, including taxi drivers, boat operators, construction workers and hotel owners.
Extortion is a pressing national issue: while the government has claimed some small victories in terms of violent crimes such as homicide, extortion has remained stubbornly high.
