MARCH TO TLATELOLCO
El Excelsior/Spanish (Mexico)
www.excelsior.com.mx
3 October 1999

by Patricia Ruiz and Alfredo Jiménez

Thousands of people participated in a march to the Plaza of Three Cultures in Tlatelolco to protest repression and authoritarianism as well as remember those who died in 1968 during a massive strike. The General Strike Council (CGH) of the National Autonomous University (UNAM) yelled, "Mexicans will never allow another 1968!"

Participants from the National Strike Council of 1968 and the CGH of 1999 came together on the 167th day of the current strike even though the demands now are more academic than political. One similarity is that both question authority.

The students on strike today surrounded by people of all ages from numerous social organizations mocked university authorities. "Take a good look at us and count us. Are we the small group that you believe has taken over the university?"

Leaders of the National Strike Council of 1968 headed the march that went from the UNAM administration building to the Plaza of Tlatelolco. During the four-hour march, the air was filled with shouts against those deemed responsible for the student conflict: the government and the university administration.

Some were dressed in black carrying a coffin with signs saying, "For my friends who died." The first student rebellion of urban and industrial Mexico was 31 years ago. The Tlatelolco massacre has ceased to be legendary and has become a metaphor for the current student strike. The march was led by students from the School of Economics carrying figures with the likeness of Ernesto Zedillo, Francisco Barnés, Francisco Labastida and Gustavo Díaz Ordaz. The strikers have maintained their stamina for 167 days and protested from 2 p.m. until past nine o'clock that night to shout their demands.

The strikers say that "the easiest solution" is a reform that says that public higher education is free. There were shouts of "assassins" against former presidents Gustavo Díaz Ordaz and Luis Echeverría and that "they should be submitted to the same judgement as Pinochet."

Editor's note: The students speak of six demands being: ceasing tuition hikes, abolishing the National Evaluation Center (a grading institute), creating a university congress open to all students, enforcing a change in the behavior of the sometimes repressive campus police, reversing 1997 reforms to separate degree programs, and for students not to be penalized for losing a semester.

A group of professors emeritus has helped to set the stage for dialogue with a proposal that urged avoiding violence and insuring that students do not fail the semester that was missed.