Now that five bodies have been found buried in clandestine
graves in the yard of the Federation of Guadalajara Students (FEG)
headquarters, the question remains: will anyone be brought to justice?
Reacting to the news, the Governor of Jalisco, Emilio
González Márquez, announced that the government will investigate the murders to
the fullest extent and, if it is found that the FEG operated as a criminal
organization, it "would have to answer before the law".
The story broke last week with the University of Guadalajara
expressing concern that five people had gone missing: three preparatory school
students, a university student, and his father.
It turned out all five had gone to the student union to discuss
fees charged to run churros (deep fried and sugared dough) stands on grounds surrounding
the University and preparatory schools. The father ran a number of these stands,
and apparently was concerned about the rising fees. In effect, the FEG seems to
have been running a protection racket, extorting money from small-scale
vendors.
By Thursday, three of the high school students – two aged
16, and one aged 17 – were found buried at the FEG headquarters. They had been
stabbed to death. On Friday, the vendor, Armando Gomez, 56, and his son Ismael,
26, were found in another grave at the same site. They had been shot in the head.
The payment structure known as derecho de piso, a system of dues that confer “rights” to conduct business,
are well-established forms of casual extortion in Mexico. Threats of violence can
lurk behind the system, but in recent years, as Mexico’s war on drugs has created
instability among criminal networks, violence has filtered into what might have
otherwise been more stable relationships.
Marco Antonio Cortes (below), an official at the University of
Guadalajara, stated
in an interview that he believes the FEG is responsible for the killings. He
claimed that the murders were "part of joint attacks that the federation
has done against the students" and further stated that FEG "dedicates
itself to extorting people who support themselves with hard work, dedicates
itself to harassing students at every level. It's capable of committing this
kind of brutality".
As well, Ruth Padilla, the Director of Education at the
University of Guadalajara, has said that there have been complaints of FEG
extortion and related crimes.
For decades the FEG has been allied with the Institutional
Revolutionary Party (PRI), which ruled Mexico for 71 years before losing the
presidency in 2000. (In 2009, the PRI re-gained plurality control of Mexican
congress, and it is poised to regain the presidency in 2012).
For its part, the FEG has denied any involvement, claiming that
it will work with authorities to help solve the case. The head of the student group,
Israel Mariscal, has asserted that the FEG, “as an institution”, has no
connection to the crimes. In this YouTube video Mariscal
claims that the FEG supports students; he cannot say how many vendors are affiliated
with the FEG, claims that the leadership is in transition, and says that the
FEG has no system of derecho de piso.
He has said that “if there’s some case of extortion, they should report it,”
adding that “there’s a vendors’ association (and) the FEG offers them legal counselling
and medical consultations at a lower cost.”
At present a guard at FEG’s offices identified by the alias
“El tatuado” (the tattooed) is a suspect in the killings. Mariscal has said
that the man is not a member of the student group.
Specifically regarding the allegations of extortion made against
the FEG, Mariscal Quezada, said:
"I have no doubt and there is someone who, abusing the good faith of the
merchants and the activities we have together, dares to do this type of
behavior.”
Given the amount of physical evidence – authorities said a
handgun, several shell casings and traces of blood were discovered at the
headquarters of the FEG – there should be ample opportunity to solve this case.
It seems apparent that the FEG, which has been accused of involvement in
previous violent incidents, will be central to solving the crime. If they
participate fully in the investigation, as promised by Mariscal Quezada, then
it might provide an opportunity to clean out the organization. The challenge of
course, is that differing levels of corruption, and threats of further violence,
may make this difficult, if not impossible.
Twitter: @TimothyEWilson
Email: lapoliticaeslapolitica [at] gmail [dot] com
No comments:
Post a Comment