ISTMO DE TEHUANTEPEC
MÉXICO
Juana Ramírez Villegas is part of the communications collective UCIZONI (Unión de Comunidades Indígenas de la Zona Norte del Istmo). She is an indigenous woman from the Mixe (Ayuuk) people of San Juan de Guichicovi, Oaxaca, Mexico. They are currently facing the construction of the inter-oceanic corridor of the Isthmus of Tehuantepec, with which the Mexican government intends to link the Atlantic Ocean with the Pacific Ocean by means of a train. Along this route, they are building industrial parks and completely changing the territory. The Mexican government has achieved this by manipulating prior consultations in order to divide and confuse the indigenous peoples who live on the Isthmus of Tehuantepec, the ancestral inhabitants of this territory. The corridor project will completely change their way of life and will affect culturally and socially the life of these peoples, historically abandoned by the Mexican state. Thanks to UCIZONI’s communication collective, they have been able to reach out to the different communities and to the national level, demanding respect for their territory and the defence of the rights of the Mixe people of Oaxaca. In the Intercultural Encounter project, this communications team was further strengthened.
Publications of the UCIZONI Communications Team
The other side of the transisthmian corridor
Hundreds of indigenous people grouped in the Union of Indigenous Communities of the Northern Zone of the Isthmus (UCIZONI) are against the imposition of the transisthmian project that aims to turn the region into a maquiladora pole that would only benefit large transnational companies. The indigenous peoples also denounce that the consultations carried out have been simulated, and that they do not represent the voice and will of the peoples. If there is no consultation, the rights of indigenous peoples are violated.
Pueblos mixes bloquean tren en el Istmo
Foto: Ucizoni Obligan a regresar a un convoy y exigen atención a demandas. En el segundo día de la Jornada Regional en Defensa de los Derechos de los Pueblos del Istmo, se realizaron dos bloqueos de las vías del ferrocarril en Barrio de la Soledad y en Mogoñé...