Every year on "Teacher's Day" in Mexico, teachers hold a rally at Oaxaca City, Mexico. Teachers are payed low wages in poor conditions in an education system which quite frankly, sucks ass. Usually the teachers get a small raise and return to work but this year they decided they were fed up with all the bullshit they've dealt with.
On June 14, The governor of Oaxaca, Ulises Ruiz Ortiz, backed by the government attacked the protestors at dawn with tear gas and riot gear and by beating the protesters with clubs, they forced the strikers to flee out of the city. The teachers returned with students, farmers, and workers to the city and after a long bloody battle, took the city and forced the police out with only stick, stones, and old fashion proletariat strength!
Since then, the workers, farmers, teachers, and students who occupy Oaxaca have taken over the radio airways and government buildings, barricadded the streets, armed themselves, and set up a completely democratic government body called the Popular Assembly of the People of Oaxaca, or the APPO.
In recent weeks, the government has stepped up it's actions against the commune, and President Fox and his regime claim that it is their number one goal to end the APPO occupation of Oaxaca before he leaves office.
Why am I posting this now? Well mainly to spread awareness. The only way the Oaxaca has a chance at surival is through pressure on the Mexican government from the outside. Protests and Rallies are a start. Two weeks ago, the Free People's Movement organized a rally here in New York which was pretty successful. It is of the utmost importance to spread awareness about the situation. I have provided two links for those who want to find out more about the Oaxaca Commune.
This Trotskyist group (Socialist Action) has been covering it well.
http://saslc.blogspot.com/2006/10/appo-defacto-government-in-oaxaca.html
Thanks for bringing this to people's attention, Lefty Henry. If it weren't for people like you we'd all have to suffer the likes of Ted Turner and Rupert Murdoch's attempts to pacify us with the all important, globaly relevant news of which celebrity vagina belched out a flesh ball this week. Kudos, man.
It is good that the teachers are demanding a better wage. But you forget to talk about the down side that is the fact that children aren't in school which means there not getting educated, and I think that that would be a worse fate for the people of Mexico!