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Mexico and the Zapatistas

onomist 38). The United States likes what Zedillo has said, and President Clinton has supported his government with NAFTA (North American Free Trade Agreement), arms, and miscellaneous handouts aimed at making Mexico a better neighbor. Unfortunately, Mexican peasants are being plowed under by Mexican and American economic interests, Mexican political corruption, and the Vatican, which seeks from afar to destroy the Zapatistas' internal leadership.

The Zapatistas are lead by a man known as Subcomandante Marcos. He heads what is officially called the Zapatista Army of National Liberation (EZLN). Marcos' real name, which was made public only recently due to his need for secrecy, is Rafael Sebastian Guillen Vicente. Mexico's federal government has discovered that "Marcos" is a 39 year-old former university professor from a well-to-do provincial family. He comes across in most of the press releases about EZLN as a Robin Hood figure, one who wants to take from the rich to give to the poor. He has the political savvy and the means to help the poor in their struggle for equality and governmental representation--in short, he has the leadership to help the people "return to a past of communal landholding, state ownership of the means of production, autonomous development, and anti-gringo nationalism" (Daniels 64).

It is interesting to note Subcomandante Marcos' title. Most people keeping watch over developments between the EZLN and Mexico's government say that the real leader of the resistance movement is a bishop named Samuel Ruiz, who also goes by an Indian name in the local dialect. He is considered the real trouble-maker among the Zapatistas because he gives the stamp of divine approval to the Indians' mission--he tells them that all people are born rich until governments start to take away what equally belongs to all.

Cecilia Rodriguez of the Funding Exchange in New York City, an organization to aid the EZLN, has outlined t...

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Mexico and the Zapatistas. (1969, December 31). In LotsofEssays.com. Retrieved 08:33, March 29, 2024, from https://www.lotsofessays.com/viewpaper/1706877.html