MEXICAN POET Javier Sicilia cuts a lonely figure as he walks Mexico’s roads of death. In March, his son, Juan Francisco (24), a business student, was gunned down after a minor scuffle with cartel members in a bar.
Sicilia, in trademark khaki fishing jacket and brown Stetson hat, has become the spokesman for the National Movement for Peace with Justice and Dignity, demanding an end to the bloody war against the drug cartels.
He responded to his son’s death by setting up a table outside the local authorities offices in his native Morelos, inviting others to share their stories.
An avalanche of testimonies followed as citizens, unwilling or afraid to denounce abuses, registered 1,200 disappeared and 3,500 deaths.
Sicilia’s “Caravan of Consolation” gathered momentum in the past three months, visiting towns around the country, while more than 100,000 people turned up in Mexico City in May.
“We have got to stay together so that we can go on making and remaking this nation that carries so much pain,” he said.
Sicilia has urged the government to acknowledge the country is in a state of emergency, devastated by a “badly planned and poorly executed” war which has brought it to its knees.
Sicilia launched a national citizen charter with six demands which focus on victims rights, the fight against corruption and the need to restore public security. The pact also demands investment in jobs and a drug strategy which would follow the money trail and clamp down on the illicit arms trade.
In his “Open Letter to Politicians and Criminals”, Sicilia linked the rise in drug-trafficking to the dominant economic ideology of self-interest and “limitless consumerism”.
With elections looming next year, Sicilia urged political parties to agree on a candidate of unity committed to a constitutional conference which would redraw the boundaries of political life, allowing voters to recall elected officials during their term of office.
Sicilia speaks softly but shows no signs of backing down should the government ignore his demands. He tells reporters that “it takes balls to strike back, to refuse to pay taxes and it will take all of us to surround parliament until our demands are heard”.
MICHAEL McCAUGHAN