Inhabitants of the municipality of Pantelho, in the federative entity of Chiapas, forced elements of the National Guard, state police and the Army to retreat or retreat several blocks from the town: the security forces maintained the control from town.
During the protests, the more than 3,000 inhabitants of the 86 communities of Pantelhó looted stores, they set fire vehicles and homes and they took the mayor’s office.
This Tuesday morning, the streets of the community they woke up as one war zone. Between debris, trash and remains of looting. On the sidewalks of the main avenues there are also men resting, hooded and armed with machetes and sticks.
“What we are demanding is that justice be done and that the Prosecutor’s Office arrest bad people”Said one of the leaders of El Machete, a new group of self-defense groups, in accordance with The Day.
The member revealed that the group did not participate in the taking of the people and that it was the communities themselves who did it. However, he remarked that “we we were supporting them but without weapons because those stayed in the camp ”.
The member of El Machete mentioned that the mayor’s office, governed by the Party of the Democratic Revolution (PRD), will remain taken until state and federal authorities do Justice.
From the July 7th, when the self-defense group broke in in the municipal seat, they have not been presented in the town the members of the City Council.
Last weekend, before the general population, the official presentation of the Tzotzil and Tzeltzil Indians of Chiapas, in southeastern Mexico, who formed self-defense groups.
The newly formed and named Self-defense groups of the El Machete people met at the football stadium of the small community of San José Tercero, in the municipality of Pantelho, where they were observed by the residents from the stands.
One of the spokesmen said in a speech that they decided to arm themselves before “Injustice, to defend his life and against the hitmen of the drug trade” and accused local authorities of colluding with criminals.
A crowd of self-defense groups, mostly men and with their faces covered, paraded on the field carrying weapons, ranging from machetes even automatic rifles.
The leaders of the groups denounced alleged attacks by the mayor’s office, demanded that public resources be audited and warned that on October 1 they will not allow the elected mayor, husband of the current local leader, Delia Velazco Flores, to take office.
On July 7, El Machete violently broke into the municipal seat of Pantelho, facing bullets with a rival group, which left thousands displaced from rural communities.
It was through a video on social networks that four individuals with long weapons they awarded said irruption, also by way of presentation as a group of self-defense groups.
The same day dozens of soldiers and policemen entered the town to maintain order, but they were ambushed on July 8, leaving six policemen and three soldiers wounded.
According to Fray Bartolomé de Las Casas Human Rights Center, AC (Frayba), about 2,000 people have been displaced due to the generalized violence of organized crime and the failure of the Mexican State to address the situation.
This association has obtained documents that indicate the presence of a criminal group in the municipality of Pantelhó, which acts in complicity with the town hall to form part of the municipal power structures, currently linked to the PRD.
Some of the issues that the residents of this region have suffered have been checkpoints, blockades and incursions by the criminal group, in the company of elements of the municipal and state police.
So far there have been operations of the Sinaloa Cartel, which has full control of the border with Guatemala; of the Jalisco New Generation Cartel (CJNG), which extends to the southwestern coast; and from Gulf Cartel, with a small strip of power that extends from the Pacific to the border with Oaxaca and the southern part of Veracruz.
This struggle to obtain the square of Chiapas it would be the trigger for the violence and forced displacement of the inhabitants of Pantelhó, as they would seek to eliminate their enemies without measuring the force of fire or if there is an innocent person involved.
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