10 years after surprise revolt, Indians look for new solutions, autonomy

By LAURENCE ILIFF and ALFREDO CORCHADO / The Dallas Morning News

A group of ragtag rebels, some carrying fake guns, shocked Mexico and the world on New Year's Day 10 years ago when it marched into several southern towns and
declared war on the government.

Today, the threat of military action against the Zapatista rebels has faded, along with their presence on the national and international stage. But the political fight for
Indian rights rages on across Mexico, analysts say, and is likely to do so for years to come.

"They came to the table without an invitation and made everyone uncomfortable," said Luis Hernández Navarro, a columnist for the Mexico City newspaper La
Jornada. "But they came to stay."

The Zapatista legacy in the decade since the rebels first appeared publicly and the 20 years since they formed in the jungles of the southern state of Chiapas has been a
radical change in the Indians' perceptions of themselves and Mexicans' perceptions of the country's poorest minority, analysts say.

"What has changed is that people in the Zapatista areas are organized and have their dignity," said Mr. Hernández, who has worked on community projects in Chiapas.
"They can look at anyone in the eye, when before they had to bow their heads."

The government's point main to find a lasting peace, Luis H. Alvarez, agreed.

"They were right to rebel 10 years ago because of the poverty and misery," Mr. Alvarez said. "Theirs was a voice that spoke for the poor of Mexico. It was a voice that
was heard, and now they are being helped" by the government.

There is still no formal peace accord between the rebels and the administration of President Vicente Fox. And the Zapatistas remain an armed group. But they also have
marched from southern Mexico to the capital peacefully and have spoken before Congress, and there has been no combat since the uprising a decade ago.

About 150 killed

The uprising launched by the Zapatista National Liberation Army, or EZLN for its initials in Spanish, led to a short-lived shooting war. After a week of fighting, a
cease-fire was called and still-incomplete peace talks were scheduled. About 150 people died in the fighting, most of them young Mayan rebels.

Since then, thousands of Indians have been displaced as a result of local disputes between pro- and anti-Zapatista groups in Chiapas, and the government and
international groups have sent aid into the region. The rebels' non-Indian spokesman, Subcomandante Marcos, has become an international darling of the
anti-globalization movement.

But despite having won greater legal rights and much media attention over the years, the nation's 11 million indigenous citizens face economic realities that are little
changed, and the Zapatistas say they will fight on.

In a message this week, the rebel group called for new actions to establish additional autonomous Indian communities without the federal government's approval.

"It's clear that no government is going to give us the right and the liberty to live in dignity, and so we are no longer asking nor demanding it," said Comandante David, a
prominent Zapatista spokesman.

"Now is the time to act and to exercise our rights as legitimate communities and the first peoples of our country," he said in a statement this week from Chiapas,
referring to the creation of 30 autonomous Indian towns that don't recognize the authority of the federal government.

While critics say it is time for the Zapatistas to join the political mainstream in a newly democratic Mexico, support remains high among the 100 million Mexicans for the
cause of Indian rights.

Daniel Lund, head of the Mund Americas polling firm, puts support for Indian rights at more than 70 percent and support for the Zapatistas at 60 percent, according to
an October survey. Those numbers have not changed much over the years, he said.

Likewise, the relatively low profile of Subcomandante Marcos in the last two years is probably a result of his savvy media strategy, analysts said, expressing skepticism
that he is sick or on the outs with the Indian leadership.

Even the day chosen for the uprising – Jan. 1, 1994 – played into what analysts consider a brilliant media strategy that later moved on to the Internet and spawned
dozens of Zapatista support groups around the world.

The same day, the historic North American Free Trade Agreement among Mexico, the United States and Canada went into effect and became a symbol for the
Zapatistas and many Mexicans of what was wrong with the government's market-oriented economic plan.

'94 full of changes

But 1994 was full of other significant events in Mexico that shook the nation to its core.

In April, the ruling party's presidential candidate, Luis Donaldo Colosio, was assassinated. In the fall, another top ruling party official was slain. In December, the peso
lost half its value against the U.S. dollar and the economy was on the verge of collapse.

In turn, those events helped set up the election of the first Mexican president from an opposition party, Mr. Fox, in 2000, analysts said.

During his campaign, Mr. Fox once quipped that he could resolve the Zapatista conflict in 15 minutes, but three years into his presidency a definitive accord remains
elusive.

Still, his administration insists that it has done everything possible to resolve the conflict, freeing Zapatistas from jail, dismantling some military installations, and promoting
an Indian rights bill in 2001 that was favored by the Zapatistas but ultimately rejected by Congress in favor of less-ambitious legislation.

"I visit Chiapas communities all the time, and I see that they are living in peace," said Mr. Alvarez, the administration's peace commissioner. The government, he said, is
delivering housing, health services and education to Indian communities, but the Zapatistas refuse to cooperate in that process.

Meanwhile, the future of the Zapatistas and the Indians rights movement is moving in some unexpected directions, analysts said.

Jan Rus, a California-based anthropologist and author of the recent book Mayan Lives, Mayan Utopias, said that many young men in Chiapas are emigrating to
Mexican cities and the United States, sending money home to bolster Indian communities and slowly finding a new place in society.

"There is a larger shifting of the tide," Mr. Rus said. "While rural impoverishment is increasing, it's driving people to find new solutions – from political activity, to
migration to the cities and the United States, to controlling their own areas."

In San Cristóbal de las Casas, a colonial Chiapas city briefly seized by the rebels 10 years ago, reaction to the anniversary was mixed.

Political tourism – mainly by foreign sympathizers of the Zapatistas – has helped replace visitors who stayed away after the uprising, and there is even a Zapatista
souvenir industry. Marcos dolls, Zapatista figurines and T-shirts are everywhere. European and U.S. activists fill the coffee shops.

But Mateo Hernández, whose radio programs in the Indian language of tzotzil have made him a popular personality among Indians, said real change has been slow.

"We remain just as poor, maybe not as forgotten as before, but certainly just as poor," he said.

As he walked through a downtown market in San Cristóbal, Mr. Hernandez greeted many of the vendors in their native language. There are more vendors than ever, he
said, because coffee prices have plummeted, forcing hundreds into the tourism industry.

"What do you think of Marcos?" he asked two women, Margarita Rosales and Benita Ramírez, both selling Marcos dolls.

"He talks too much," Ms. Rosales said.

"He's good for business," Ms. Ramírez added. "But he's no Zapata," a reference to Emiliano Zapata, whose indigenous movement during the 1910 Mexican Revolution
inspired the modern-day Zapatistas.

Since the uprising, the husbands of both women have left for the United States and now work in North Carolina making furniture.

"Many got tired and disillusioned with Marcos' empty rhetoric and promises," said Mr. Hernández, whose radio program takes daily calls from Chiapas immigrants in the
United States. "They've become deserters of the Zapatista army."

Laurence Iliff reported from Mexico City and Alfredo Corchado from Chiapas.