The tragedy of the Chols: A People torn apart by violence

In recent months the attention of public opinion has focused on the conflict in the northern region of Chiapas, hitherto relatively unknown due to the area’s geographic, political and cultural isolation. A virtual civil war has come to light through the insistence of national and international non-governmental organizations and organized civil society who have succeeded in piercing the wall of silence.

Many of the inhabitants of the northern region had demonstrated their sympathy with the EZLN by participating in the Zapatista takeover of local municipal governments in December 1994; building a Zapatista meeting facility (Aguascalientes); and heeding the Zapatista call to abstain from voting in the 1995 elections. Nonetheless, the northern region has not been recognized as part of the “conflict area.”

Geopolitically the northern region represents a strategic corridor connecting the Zapatista-held territories with the Chontal Indian civil resistance movement and the PRD (Democratic Revolutionary Party) stronghold in the state of Tabasco. Consequently there has been a growing military presence in the area and an escalation of activities by PRI-backed paramilitary groups, in particular an organization called “Peace and Justice” (Paz y Justicia).

A history of opression and marginalization

The northern region is commonly considered to include the municipalities of Tila, Sabanilla, Salto de Agua and Tumbala, extending to the borders of Chilon and Palenque and the state of Tabasco. Most of the inhabitants in the northern region are Chol Indians whose ancestors built some of the richest expressions of the Mayan civilization. Because of the difficult geographical conditions and the firm resistance of the Chol people, the area was not easily brought into submission by the Spanish conquerors of the 16th century.

The political instability and the relative poverty of the region combined with the hostile mountainous terrain kept the Chols isolated and marginalized. Displacement of the Chols from their tribal lands began toward the end of Spanish rule when the “caxlanes” (foreigners; includes whites and mixed bloods) began to demand land from the authorities in order to log hardwoods and exploit other valuable tropical products.

Bitter coffee

By the end of the 19^th century, the economics of the region were transformed significantly by the emergence of foreign-owned agro- export enterprises. The main product from these isolated plantations was coffee. Most Chols lost their land and became virtually enslaved. The Mexican revolution (1910-17) had a negligible effect on the social and economic structures there.

The agrarian movement began to grow in Chiapas only in the 1920s. It reached its peak a decade later during the nationalist presidency of Lázaro Cardenas when land-holdings were redistributed to the Chols.

In return, the Chols remained faithful to the ruling PRI (Institutional Revolutionary Party) for several decades. However, by the 1970s the hegemony of the PRI began to weaken as a result of several factors. The Chol people were being influenced by the focus on empowerment of the pastoral ministry of the diocese of San Cristobal and by the activities of social organizations (including the Union of Unions – later to become the very influential Rural Association of Collective Interest, ARIC.) The world market price of coffee collapsed. In addition a general sense of disillusionment with the central government took hold among community leaders – such as catechists, bilingual teachers, and cooperative officials – in the face of the abandonment and the contradictions perceived in government policy.

Once again the Chols found themselves marginalized and isolated as a group. However at this point a deep schism emerged between those who had begun to consider the PRI as a traitor to their cause and the traditionalists who supported the PRI unconditionally. This latter group, in particular some schoolteachers and cooperative officials, gave birth to the paramilitary group “Peace and Justice”.

Elections of discord

The PRI’s loss of dominance in the northern region became evident more in the 1994 and 1995 elections than from the Zapatista uprising. In the 1994 gubernatorial and congressional elections, the victory of the opposition was concealed by official party fraud.

No longer being able to count on an ideological consensus, the PRI maintained control through brute force. “Peace and Justice” was organized in early 1995 in Tila. It began its paramilitary attacks on the population in March. The first victims were catechists, school teachers and community leaders. The violence escalated as the electoral campaign proceeded. Between June and July several members of the opposition PRD (Democratic Revolutionary Party) were killed in ambushes. In August the paramilitary group joined forces with cattle ranchers to remove peasants from occupied lands. In September, attacks on the opposition in PRI-dominated communities escalated and many PRD-affiliated families were forced to flee their homes. At this point the PRD supporters began to respond. Although much fewer in number, these PRD attacks drove PRI supporters from some communities where they were a minority.

In the October 1995 elections, the violent intimidation by the PRI- supporters and the Zapatista orders to boycott the vote resulted in large-scale abstention. The result was the victory once again of the PRI even though it did not receive more than 22.5% of the potential votes. It was in this election that Samuel Sanchez Sanchez, a Chol school teacher from Tila and founder of “Peace and Justice,” was elected to the state legislature. “Peace and Justice” members, including Marcos Albino Torres, also won seats on the Tila municipal council.

The endless war

The aftermath of those elections was a generalized loss of legitimacy of the electoral process and a radicalization and polarization of the opposing sides – fertile ground for the open conflict that has since developed.

While the Chiapas state government has, in the past year, promoted negotiations between the conflicting sides to deal with the issue of the internal refugees, often the government representatives failed to appear for meetings. The situation would be left in the hands of “Peace and Justice” who, with the support of the state police, at times harassed and even arrested the representatives of the displaced people.

In June of 1996 the PRD took to the offensive and ensuing confrontations resulted in deaths on both sides. A rumor of impending bombings by the army, which openly supports the PRI people, led to the flight of over 1,400 PRD-supporters from the communities around Jolnixtie (Tila). In little over a year, the number of killings in the northern region has risen to more than 300 and the number of displaced people to about 3,000. Meanwhile, the state authorities refer to the situation as nothing more than “unrest“.

The Northern Station: A white flag on the Battlefield

Responding to this wave of violence, in August 1996 two local non- governmental organizations, the Fray Bartolomé de las Casas Human Rights Center (CDHFBC) and the Center for Indigenous Rights (CEDIAC), and two international organizations, SIPAZ and Global Exchange, formed a team to monitor and document the situation in the northern region. The project was called the Northern Station for Easing of Tension and Reconciliation. In October the Coordinating Agency of Non-Governmental Organizations for Peace (CONPAZ) joined the effort. As the name suggests, besides monitoring the region, the project proposed to contribute to the search for means of achieving peace in the Chol region.

The presence of the team in the region did not go unnoticed. Their movements were watched and obstructed, team members were threatened, detained, robbed and even attacked by the paramilitary group “Peace and Justice.” The local police forces and the military began to maintain a certain distance from the paramilitaries in an attempt to project a public image of impartiality and a concern for bringing about peace. Public officials accelerated the process of returning displaced people to their communities. (No doubt the Zapatista demands for an end to the violence in the northern region as one of their conditions for returning to the peace talks was also an influential factor.)

The extreme vulnerability of the displaced was underscored by the numerous complaints, accusations and demands which the Northern Station gathered from victims. They found many cases of civil rights abuses and intimidations by the paramilitary groups which continued to act with impunity.

Notwithstanding the lack of guarantees from the authorities and the threats from “Peace and Justice,” which now refused to participate in negotiations with the government and the displaced PRD members, between October 1996 and January 1997 all the displaced families from Tila returned to their communities. However, the harassment has not ended. According to Congresswoman Adriana Luna Parra, in Jolnixtie a payment of 1000-1500 pesos is demanded of those who return as well as a signed promise to not affiliate with any opposition party. They are allowed to enter and leave only with safe conduct passes signed by “Peace and Justice.” (La Jornada, March 30, 1997)

In addition, the fragile stability in Tila contrasted with an alarming eruption of violence between PRI- and PRD-supporters in the neighboring municipalities of Sabanilla, Palenque and El Bosque. Since the beginning of 1997, about 20 people have been killed and hundreds more have been driven from their homes. (See “A Smoldering Cease-fire” .)

Who’s Who in the Northern Region

According to state legislator Samuel Sanchez Sanchez, the establishment of “Peace and Justice” was a response to the growing radicalization of PRD and Zapatista supporters in the communities. In other words, the paramilitary group was designed as an instrument of counterinsurgency. It is financed by ranchers’ organizations, and it is directed by an elite group of indigenous leaders. Politically it is backed by PRI leaders in Tila, and it enjoys the overt and covert support of congresspeople, the police forces, the Mexican military, and the judicial system. The Public Ministry office has been an accomplice of the paramilitary group, accepting unproven charges and ordering the arbitrary arrests of PRD supporters. Indeed “Peace and Justice” has been very effective in neutralizing members of the opposition. Dozens of Chol political prisoners are currently imprisoned in Chiapas, organized in the movement called “The Voice of Cerro Hueco Prison.”

It is clear that the PRD and the EZLN have a strong base of support in the northern region even though this support does not necessarily translate into militant membership. Rather the Chols joined with these organizations in questioning the authority of the PRI. However, in our opinion both the PRD and the EZLN have neglected these supporters during some very difficult moments. Only at the end of August, after a year of continuous crises, did the EZLN include the cessation of the violence in the northern region in its demands to the government. In practice, this concern never became an important issue. Only in the last months of 1996, with the 1997 elections in view, did the PRD attempt to develop a more permanent relationship with its Chol base of support by sending state and federal legislators to the area.

Another ambivalent player in the unfolding tragedy of the northern region has been the government of the state of Chiapas with its internal contradictions and two-faced policies. While publicly expressing a will to broker negotiations for peace, the government continues to allow the PRI-supported paramilitary groups to act with absolute impunity.

Perhaps the least known actor in this scenario has recently become a major protagonist. The Mexican army, which in the past has repeatedly aligned itself with “Peace and Justice,” has now adopted a role consistent with the strategy of low-intensity warfare: it is implementing social assistance programs in the communities and articulating a discourse and policies aimed at winning the hearts and minds of the people and legitimating its image in public opinion. At the same time it is extending its presence in order to militarily control the entire conflict area.

Angels and Demons: Religion as an ideological weapon

Although the roots of the problem in the northern region are essentially political, the conflict has been presented by some as a religious issue. There are obvious parallels between the ideological differences of the PRI and the PRD and the religious polarization that has emerged between the conservative teachings of the evangelical churches and the liberation theology movement within the Catholic Church. There is also a strong relationship between the leadership of “Peace and Justice” and some evangelical pastors. In fact the roles have sometimes overlapped. Their rhetoric, too, is very similar: both groups demonize Bishop Samuel Ruiz and his pastoral agents, accusing them of creating division between the Chol people and provoking the violence.

Because of the growing religious intolerance, in which both the Catholic and the evangelical churches have been participants, religious leaders, in particular from the Presbyterian Church and from the diocese of the Catholic Church in San Cristobal, have promoted new ecumenical initiatives aimed at nurturing a process of reconciliation in the communities. This task is as difficult as it is necessary in order to revitalize the weakened peace process.

What next?

The wave of violence that has hit the northern region of Chiapas in the first few months of this year (See “A Smoldering Cease-fire” ) indicates that the problem, which was hitherto contained primarily within four municipalities, is spreading to other parts of the state. Once again, the impunity that has accompanied past violence is demonstrated to be the surest way to guarantee more of the same.

The Northern Station has repeatedly declared that this conflict cannot be ignored in the dialogue between the EZLN and the government. The standstill of the peace talks since September of last year, which Sub-Commander Marcos has described as at a “terminal stage,” dramatizes the urgency of achieving a political solution to the conflict. The continued exclusion of the northern region from the formally recognized “conflict area” opens the possibility of a new frontier of war, unprotected by the presence of permanent observers, where brutal counterinsurgency tactics can be deployed with a minimal political price.

Meanwhile, the electoral campaign and the upcoming legislative elections in July present both a threat and a challenge to the federal, state and local political leadership: either repeat the experiences of 1994 and 1995 that brought the Chols to the brink of civil war or undertake a legitimate political struggle, respecting political differences. In the coming months, the state and federal governments will have a great responsibility for the course of events there and in the rest of Chiapas.

 This article is based on a publication entitled “Ni Paz ni Justicia” (“Neither Peace nor Justice”), written by the Fray Bartolome de las Casas Human Rights Center.