While other parts of Oaxaca,
Mexico’s predominantly Indian, ag-
ricultural state, attract anthropolo-
gists and others interested in ruins,
Juchitan draws only political scien-
tists, goes a town joke. Juchitan–
the state’s second largest city-is
the only major Mexican city con-
trolled by leftists. But maintaining
that control has not been easy.
The government of the munici-
Judith Matloff is a U.S. journalist
working in Mexico. Her last contri-
bution to the Report was “Mexican
Elections-To PRI or Not to PRI?” in
the March-April 1982 issue.
NIiD sea2
pality of about 80,000, located on
the wet isthmus leading to Guate-
mala, has met harassment from
right-wing forces and the Institu-
tional Revolutionary Party (PRI)
which has held national power for
53 years.
Though many call Juchitan “that
communist town,” only two of the
municipal government’s nine mem-
bers are from the Mexican United
Socialist Party or PSUM, the leftist
amalgam formed in August 1981 of
which the former Communist Party
is a member. The other seven–
including the mayor-are from
COCEI, the popular Coalition of
Isthmus Workers, Peasants and
Students.
Three Mexican towns have Com-
munist municipal governments:
Alcozauca in Guerrero State and
Tlacolulita and Magdalena Acotlan
in Oaxaca State, all elected before
the leftist merger. Because these
villages, each with about 1,000 resi-
dents, are so small, they have not
attracted the notoriety of Juchitan.
Three major cities have PSUM regi-
dores or city council members:
Puebla City, Puebla State; Jalapa,
Veracruz State; and Durango City,
Durango State.
Juchitan’s COCEI is an independ-
41update update update update
ent group which once preferred
seizing municipal buses to voting as
a political strategy. Now nearly a
decade old, COCEI has participated
in local elections since 1974.
COCEI and the Communist Party
linked up in the November 1980
elections. Saying the PRI’s victory
was fraudulent, coalition members
seized town hall. The state govern-
ment nullified the election results
and a March 1981 plebiscite swept
the coalition into power by several
hundred votes.
Social Rejuvenation
To enter Juchitan’s town hall one
must now wade through long lines
of peasants, who are received by
Mayor Leopoldo de Gyves 14 hours
a day. Cement bags, boards, pick-
axes and construction workers clut-
ter the entrance.
“The building used to have so
many holes, we couldn’t work dur-
ing the rainy season,” says the
Juchitan mayor Leopoldo de Gyves.
mayor. “But now it’s finally being
fixed.”
The town hall’s reconstruction
symbolizes Juchitan’s political and
social rejuvenation. In less than two
years, the new city government has
tackled some problems commonly
COCEI posters decry previous PRI mayors. “Juchitan Fights Back! ! ”
unresolved by the PRI all over
Mexico.
The coalition government has
taught hundreds of adults to read
and write (adult illiteracy was
around 80%), kicked out corrupt
policemen, fixed roads and quad-
rupled the number of health clinics.
Via neighborhood consciousness-
raising groups which discuss com-
plaints weekly, city officials main-
tain close contact with towns-
people, enlist volunteers for the lit-
eracy campaign and health bri-
gades and grapple with nagging
problems.
The groups, for example, de-
cided to clean up Juchitan’s open,
central market where poor hygiene,
along with the city’s open sewers
which render 50% of Juchitan’s
water undrinkable, were causing
endemic gastrointestinal and respi-
ratory diseases. Now, stall owners
donate materials to collectively
scour and fumigate the rat-infested
area every four months. The coali-
tion also wants to renovate the anti-
quated market which serves ten-
fold its official capacity. Opening
more markets would improve
health conditions and create more
jobs in a region where unemploy-
ment is higher than the national
average.
Harassment From The Right
But municipal leaders say eco-
nomic pressures from the PRI-run
government make these aspira-
tions nearly unattainable. Mayor de
Gyves claims the state government
froze $5.7 million worth of credit.
The state also intervened to con-
duct the first audit of the town’s
holdings ‘since the 1910 Mexican
revolution.
“They said it was because we
were giving money to Mexican and
Central American guerrillas,” ex-
plains one COCEI leader.
mCUlnepOupdate update update update
Not only public funds are scarce.
“No one wants to invest in Juchitan
since the Reds took over,” says
Darien Santiago Rasgado, local PRI
committee president.
Forced to rely almost entirely on
local resources, the neighborhood
Section Committees collect money
door to door. Volunteer labor and
book.donations helped launch Ju-
chitan’s new cooperatively run li-
brary.
The movement has also been de-
bilitated by violence against COCEI
militants. Ten years of murders and
kidnappings of COCEI leaders-
allegedly by the pro-PRI paramili-
tary group, “Brigada Blanca,”
based in nearby Salina Cruz-in-
cluded two assassinations last year.
Last August, two more PSUM-
COCEI sympathizers were killed
and six wounded by gunmen who
attacked the crowd at the inaugura-
tion of a new health center in
Chicapa de Castro, Oaxaca. Count-
less other COCEI activists, includ-
ing the mayor, have faced death
threats and attempts on their lives.
“They’re out to get us,” says PSUM
city councilman, Deciderio de
Gyves, an uncle of the mayor.
Mass Base & PSUM Expertise
COCEI and PSUM embrace radi-
cally different perspectives. COCEI
emphasizes short-term goals like
building sewers and expropriating
large landholdings which they turn
over to peasants farming the land.
The nationwide PSUM calls for “de-
mocracy and socialism,” and de-
mands massive structural change.
But, despite this, the two groups
complement each other.
“We respect COCEI as the real
vanguard of the people,” says Cle-
mente Jesus Lopez, a regional
PSUM organizer. “They offer us a
mass base, and we provide them
governing and financial expertise.”
NeIlDaclMl2
Town Hall–“so many holes, we couldn’t work during the rainy season.”
COCEI leaders interviewed agreed.
Most townspeople see the two
groups as one-“The Coalition.”
They support the coalition, but
question its effectiveness, and
sometimes express impatience that
more can’t be accomplished more
quickly. “The coalition hasn’t done
much concrete,” says Luis, a coco-
nut vendor, summing up a common
view. “But they’re very well liked
here.”
Pro-PRI Juchiteros interviewed
showed that at least some residents
have fallen victim to misinformation
about the coalition government,
claiming it committed murder and
ran drugs. None could give con-
crete examples.
Economic Strangulation
One PSUM-COCEI supporter in
Juchitan won a seat among the 100
opposition members of Mexico’s
Congress in July’s general elec-
tions. But the PRI netted over 50%
of the city’s presidential votes-be-
cause it trucked in people from
other towns who voted more than
once, according lo councilman de
Gyves.
The election figures do seem
suspicious, considering that PSUM
presidential candidate Martinez
Verdugo drew an enthusiastic
crowd of thousands last January,
while PRI candidate Miguel de la
Madrid Hurtado’s visit provoked
mostly apathy and a little hostility.
According to one Juchitan-born
academic, a PSUM supporter, “The
PRI’s economic strangulation af-
fected our popular support in the
elections. They also control the
countryside, while we control only
Juchitan City proper.”
Crucial is how this “economic
strangulation” will affect Juchitan’s
next municipal elections scheduled
for November 1983. “Frankly, we’re
worried,” says one Mexico City
PSUM official.
Yet, even if the coalition loses,
Mexico will have witnessed a local
government which seriously tried to
address problems glossed over by
the PRI. PSUM and COCEI have af-
firmed the potential of alliances be-
tween parties and independent
groups. And the twb bodies have
learned some important political
lessons from each other-PSUM,
about how to develop a regional
mass base, and COCEI, about the
need for integrating into a more
powerful, national movement.
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