The Woes of Pantelhó and Chenalhó July 13, 2021
Pantelhó and Chenalhó are two sister communities, 60 km to the north of San Cristóbal, that are not likely to be on any tourist’s itinerary, and nor shall they be, as these small villages have been made unlivable this week due to insane gang violence directed at the townspeople. It is estimated that some 2000 frightened villagers arrived in San Cristóbal over the weekend, fleeing their homes and desperate for food, blankets, and medicines.
Fray Bartolomé de las Casas, a social relief organization in the city has received the refugees and has launched a drive for goods and services, while a caravan of heavily armed federal military vehicles has arrived as a show of force, should the anarchists that have descended on Pantelhó and Chenalhó decide to take on a bigger target.
The crisis began on Tuesday morning with the daylight assassination of Simón Pedro Pérez López, the leader of a Tzotzil human rights organization. He was shopping with his young family, when his assailant shot him multiple times and sped off on a motorcycle, causing an uproar in the indigenous community. The mafia organization responsible has been a growing presence in the small townships and is allegedly connected to narcotics traffickers in Sinaloa, or perhaps Campeche, as well as locally elected town officials. Regardless of their nefarious affiliations, the angry residents of Pantelhó and Chenalhó knew who the bad guys were and organized a resistance. This is when the gangsters turned their guns on the towns themselves.
The timing of the violence seems connected to a letter recently drafted by Simón Pedro, in which he appeals to civil authority in Mexico City to investigate the siege of the townships and to rescue its residents. The slow federal and state response to the organized crime problem confirms in the minds of many that civil authority at many levels is involved in the paramilitary criminality, leaving residents no option but to grab their families and run. Photographs of the exodus show young people carrying elders over their shoulders. Remarkably, 6 days into the attack, there are no press reports to be found regarding this latest humanitarian crisis in Chiapas.
Why is this happening? Speculation is rife. Most plausible is the scenario in which the dark forces are attempting to establish a safe zone close to the Guatemala border to facilitate the flow of drugs, weapons, and human contraband. The cartels understand that the sovereignty prized by Chiapanecos can benefit their own illegal enterprises, so it is conceivable that they are trying to carve a little piece of the indigenous dream for themselves. Meanwhile, the natives are caught in the crossfire. Their purported saviors—the Zapatistas—are currently on a celebrated tour of Europe to commemorate 500 years of resistance. It seems that a few more years yet will be necessary.