During President Andrés Manuel López Obrador’s work tour in Guerrero, students from the Benito Juárez University for Welfare protested on the Tixtla-Chilapa federal highway to demand the construction of their building.
“We want to speak peacefully, it’s been three years without school” and “We demand a dignified venue,” read some banners.
At this point, President López Obrador spoke with the demonstrators and assured them that the general coordinator of the Welfare Universities, Raquel Sosa, will go to Guerrero and inform them that her building will be built.
“I have already committed to you that next week the teacher Raquel Sosa will be there so that the land is obtained and the university is built in Tixtla,” he said.
After that brief message, the students cheered on him. López Obrador responded with “vivas” to Vicente Guerrero and Ignacio Manuel Altamirano and continued on his way to Chilapa.
Before López Obrador crossed that point, Governor Evelyn Salgado, aboard her truck, passed through this place, but did not get off to attend to the students.
Rudy José Morales Guillén, a professor at this university, said that since this school was founded in Tixtla, the authorities have not built the building. It is a university that teaches the degree in Nursing.
“Here in Guerrero we have exhausted all the instances, with the Moreno mayor Antonio Moisés González Cabañas, who responds with insults, and with the state authorities they do not pay attention to us either,” said Morales Guillén.
The demonstrators stood on the side of the road in front of the statue of Vicente Guerrero, at the exit of Tixtla.
The professor said that in the case of the state government, the protesters have talked with authorities, but they have only dragged their feet on the matter.
“What we require is land for the construction of our building for students to take classes there,” he said.
Since the university was founded three years ago, the thousand 200 students receive classes in groups from different schools, some in high school 29 and others in the Heroines of the South Normal School.
Read: AMLO promises 55 new Welfare Universities and government positions to the graduates of his six-year term
At another point on this federal road, children from an elementary school in the community of Xochimilco protested with banners to demand the reconstruction of their building, which is in poor physical condition.
“We are at risk because of poor school conditions,” read one of the banners.
The community of Xochimilco is less than 15 minutes away from Chilapa.
López Obrador was in Chilapa and Tlapa, where he made an evaluation of the 23 artisanal roads that since the middle of this year are built in the region of the High Mountain and Low Mountain of Guerrero.
The president’s two-day visit to Guerrero comes in the context of the growth of protests over educational demands in various municipalities of the state.
Since Monday, October 17, some 4,000 students from eight public schools are on strike and have taken over their buildings to demand that the governor deliver the budget for their professional tasks, teaching materials and good quality lap top computers.
On Friday, October 14, the normalistas were evicted by state police while blocking the Autopista del Sol and several streets in Chilpancingo, capital of Guerrero. The balance of the eviction was 10 normalistas injured.
This text was originally published on the site Poppy Journalism.
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