Mothers and relatives of disappeared people in Guanajuato simulated clandestine graves in front of the National Palace, with the aim of getting President Andrés Manuel López Obrador to recognize that disappearances, massacres and human rights violations continue to occur in the state.
The mobilization was carried out under the slogan “if Andrés Manuel does not go to the graves, the graves come to him” and represented with earth the more than 176 clandestine graves that have been found in Guanajuato during the current government.
The preparations began before 7 in the morning, when a truck loaded with earth arrived at the esplanade of the Zócalo capital and dropped its contents in front of the presidential compound, where the morning conference was being prepared.
Phrases like “The truth cannot remain buried”, “Instead of kisses and hugs we have bullets”; “What if I find you, president?” and “We don’t come to attack an idol, we come to demand of a president” were marked on the asphalt before being covered with dirt.
See also: In less than a year, Mexico added 6,000 disappearances and more than a thousand bodies in clandestine graves
Once this was done, the mothers installed tarps with photographs of their missing loved ones, and then revealed – with shovels and picks that they use in the searches – the phrases, as an act of unearthing.
“We don’t want to bury them, we want to hug them!” they sang as they discovered the phrases and when it came time to go through the list of the disappeared after each name they shouted: “present, now and always”.
“Because when the authorities told us that there were no clandestine graves in the state, we with our hands full of dirt and love showed them that they were,” they said in a joint statement, published on social networks.
“We seek the face of justice, we seek answers, we seek the truth. We look for life and to do so we have to fight to discover what has taken our breath away.”
If @lopezobrador_ does not go to the pits, we bring them to them. These are the graves that show the absence of the State, they are not from the past. It is not a matter of colors or governments, let’s seek justice! We don’t want to bury them we want to hug them. #LaAusenciaSeSiente pic.twitter.com/kwya7UxhUc
— Until I Find You (@HEncontrarte) December 13, 2021
After the roll call, they read the list of petitions, headed with the demand for a public hearing, to present their needs and demands.
They also demanded that López Obrador recognize that the crisis in Guanajuato is the responsibility of his government, “because his strategy of militarized security and combating the huachicol has resulted in an increase in violence.”
The collectives asked that the safety of the search engines be guaranteed, since several are threatened and their lives are in danger, and requested truth, memory, reparation measures and non-repetition mechanisms.
They demand working groups with the three levels of government and a communication channel between the Attorney General’s Office (FGR), the State Prosecutor’s Office of Guanajuato and the families, “because they are not isolated cases but respond to a structural violence that has grown under the protection of governments.”
Also a regional coordination plan with the National Search Commission and the local commissions of Zacatecas, Michoacán, Querétaro, Jalisco, Aguascalientes, Guanajuato and San Luis Potosí.
Read also: Forensic crisis: more than 30,000 unidentified bodies are buried in mass graves
“That priority be given to searches in life from the federal authorities. Increase the budget for the Commission for Attention to Victims and guarantee reparation and attention to victims of violence, as well as progress in the procedures of the Benito Juárez scholarships, promised since last year,” they concluded.
“And you, while you presume that in your government everything is going well, has not had the decency to sit and listen to the victims of the Mexican Republic. You knew the problem of disappearance, you know it continues, and when you proposed for this position you knew the problems that society was facing,” they shouted outside the National Palace.
In the statement published on social networks, signed by the collectives ‘A promise to fulfill’, ‘A light on my way’ and ‘Until I find you’, they pointed out that they are the proof of forced disappearances, as a response to the request that López Obrador made to the UN on this.
“That is why today we bring him the graves in front of the National Palace, because we get tired of asking for audiences from deaf ears. Because we are tired of burying our loved ones when we want to hug them.
“Because digging up love also meansHe unearthed the truth. Because the last two times he was in Irapuato, he ignored our pleas and once again we hope that our presence does not mean a threat to his presidential inauguration.”
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