The Brave in Mexico Are On Their Own

From that historic phrase of the reformer Guillermo Prieto, who in 1858 prevented the assassination of President Benito Juárez at the hands of conservative soldiers with the cry of “the brave do not assassinate,” we have moved in present-day Mexico to a new and painful sentiment that faithfully describes what happens in this violent country and its failed states to the few brave Mexicans who today dare to raise their voices to denounce the impunity and total control of organized crime throughout the Republic: “the brave are assassinated.”

And the truth is that any Mexican who is dissatisfied with the situation of insecurity and violence we live in, who dares to denounce and raise their voice pointing to organized crime for extortion, dispossession, disappearances, or murders, automatically finds a target on their back or head.

It doesn’t matter if it’s a mother searching for information and support to find her children, or a defender of land and forests, or an agricultural leader denouncing and accusing criminals of abuse, or a journalist, or a human rights defender, or a social leader, or a priest; anyone who dares to denounce and challenge criminal power, regardless of origin, sex, or social status, can expect death in this country.

Because in this country, the brave are alone, and the inept and absent governments cannot or will do anything to defend them, because even they themselves admit that what truly rules and governs Mexico today is drug trafficking and its reign of terror through hired assassins.

It is they, not the federal, state, and municipal authorities, who already control and decide social, political, and economic life, collecting taxes from Mexican producers, controlling prices and supplies in various economic sectors, from agriculture to construction, imposing rulers and assassinating those who refuse to submit to their designs, and disrupting the peace and tranquility they have stolen from the inhabitants of this country.

Today, the cowardly and cruel assassination of another mayor, Carlos Manzo, of Uruapan, Michoacán, has shocked the nation and become international news. His only crime was refusing to remain silent and denouncing the corruption and collusion that exists in his state between the government of Alfredo Ramírez Bedolla, a member of the MORENA party, and the drug cartels that continue to operate with complete impunity in Michoacán.

His death, after denouncing the links and protection afforded to criminals in his region, and after repeatedly requesting support and assistance from the governor and President Claudia Sheinbaum in the face of threats from drug cartels, confirms that not only is there no control or governance in large regions of the country where authorities no longer have any control, but also that it is pointless to talk about “intelligence strategies” or boast about crime reduction figures if the State is incapable of protecting not only ordinary citizens, but also the authorities themselves, who, even when pleading for help, are not spared from being killed by drug cartel bullets.

And if the federal government’s failure is unforgivable—the president’s refusal to heed the mayor’s pleas that he might be killed if he didn’t receive prompt federal or state aid—Governor Ramírez Bedolla’s attitude of indifference and utter contempt for the murdered mayor would, in a normal democracy, warrant the immediate resignation of a leader who cannot control what happens in his state and who, in less than 15 days, has seen an agricultural leader, Bernardo Bravo, killed for denouncing the corruption and extortion of organized crime, and now Carlos Manzo killed for accusing the governor and his Civil Guard of failing to protect the population and siding with the criminals.

Bedolla’s cynicism and insensitivity are so profound that he even dared to show up yesterday at the funeral of Mayor Manzo, whom he never listened to or acknowledged when he made complaints or pleas for support. He received exactly what he earned from the people of Uruapan and many Michoacán residents: shouts of “Murderer” and “Get out!” as they repudiated him and drove him from the funeral he intended to attend to show a solidarity he never offered the slain mayor while he was alive.

But what is most outrageous and simultaneously shocking about this assassination is the stark and powerful message that organized crime sends by killing a mayor right on the Day of the Dead festivities, in front of a plaza packed with citizens, including children, like the little boy who, minutes before he was shot, was hugging Carlos Manzo. This didn’t matter to the criminals who blended into the crowd and surprised the mayor’s scant security detail. They killed him after a struggle in which the victim tried to resist, before the sound of gunshots, accompanied by the song “La Llorona,” left Manzo’s young, lifeless body lying face down.

With the murder of Uruapan, the number of mayors assassinated has reached 10 in just the first year of Dr. Sheinbaum’s administration. Adding to this the previous counts, Mexico’s municipalities have become graveyards, places where authority is merely symbolic because real power in the municipalities is imposed by drug cartels. Mayors who cooperate are corrupted and intimidated, stripped of their power, and those who resist or decide to denounce them are simply killed, given the inaction and incapacity of the governors and the Presidency of the Republic to protect them.

“File a complaint, file your report,” is repeated daily from the National Palace, and yet when someone does file a complaint and pleads for help insistently and desperately, as Mayor Carlos Manzo did for months, they are not listened to, and worse, they are left alone and at the mercy of the criminals who only have to wait for the right moment—a lapse in attention, a mass gathering, or any situation—to literally hunt down the brave souls who dared to speak out.

It is becoming increasingly clear and evident that the government at all levels and the State itself are more than overwhelmed, and although they have the force and the weapons to end organized crime, what they lack, unlike the courageous Mexicans who raise their voices, is precisely the courage and the resolve to eradicate this cancer that is eating away at the very roots of this country. Why can’t the president order operations to forcefully enter failed states like Michoacán, Guerrero, Sinaloa, and any other the reader can think of, and put an end once and for all to those criminals capable of murdering a father who, just moments before, was holding his child in his arms?

Why can’t a left-wing government, like that of Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, send its elite police forces to dismantle a cartel like the one that operated in the favelas of Rio de Janeiro, even if it comes at a social and political cost, just to finally put an end to the criminal mafias that dominate and control territories, cities, and states?

The murder of Manzo demonstrates that, under the misguided argument of “the human rights of criminals” so often championed and defended by López Obrador, the federal government has become complicit with and protector of drug traffickers. Even with the force and weapons to annihilate them, it prefers to tolerate them and allow them to continue controlling entire cities, including state capitals, while simultaneously sowing terror among Mexicans and mercilessly killing anyone who resists or denounces them.

Either the governor decides to finally break with the past and significantly strengthen and improve the intelligence of her strategy to rescue failing cities and regions, such as Michoacán, Sinaloa, Jalisco, Guerrero, and many others, or her government simply won’t last. Mexicans are fed up and desperate to the point that it won’t be long before someone calls them to arms in self-defense. And then, when the brave grow tired of being alone and being mercilessly murdered, the authorities will be completely overwhelmed.

INSCREET NOTES… A first glimpse of the anarchy and chaos gripping Michoacán occurred yesterday when groups of citizens, enraged by the assassination of Carlos Manzo, stormed the State Government Palace in Morelia after a demonstration to condemn the murder of the mayor of Uruapan. The scenes of Michoacán residents vandalizing and attacking the offices of Governor Alfredo Ramírez Bedolla are a clear indication of the frustration and desperation felt by the state’s population in the face of the authorities’ ineffectiveness. If we add to this the growing calls among lemon producers in the Buenavista-Tepalcatepec corridor and the Apatzingán Valley to arm themselves for self-defense, it is clear that the population is reaching a dangerous level of discontent.

President Sheinbaum’s promise that “justice will be done” in the mayor’s murder, along with the emergency meeting of her security cabinet, reflects the good intentions of this government, but also reaffirms that today’s authorities in Mexico are merely reactive, always reacting late and with the same promises of “doing justice,” of “deeply regretting,” of saying that criminals will be stopped “no matter who they are,” when all they manage to do is arrest hitmen who are paid to kill, but they never reach the masterminds behind high-impact crimes.

And yes, investigations will come, the Army and the Michoacán security cabinet will be deployed while the public anger and outrage subside, but then they will once again abandon the people of Michoacán, Sinaloa, Guerrero, and all Mexicans, who will remain at the mercy of organized crime, as long as we lack leaders with the courage and resolve to end impunity and the political ties that shield criminal violence in Mexico… The dice have been cast, snake eyes. November arrived in full force, and death, once a kind and even friendly figure, has revealed its most horrific and cruel face in Michoacán.

Source:s: El Universal