The subcomandante himself did not appear at Oventic. He was laid low by a tummy upset. The Oventic festival was originally called to provide a formal close to the so-called encounter areas. The Zapatistas took the opportunity to announce that they were setting up Juntas de Buen Gobierno for the 30 municipalities.
The move seems to indicate that the Zapatistas are once again trying to become a political force rather than a revolutionary and paramilitary group. The subcomandante said, in a taped message, that the good government boards would be in place for nine months and would help the municipalities move from relying on the military support of the Zapatistas to standing on their own. At the end of the transition period, the municipalities would deal with the government, while the EZLN would fade into the background. He stressed that the EZLN would remain ready to defend the municipalities, but would cease to provide the leadership for the movement.
The subcomandante added that the EZLN would also withdraw its roadblocks in its area, which it has used to extract payments from motorists. The EZLN sprang to fame with an uprising on 1 January 1994 to protest against the establishment of the North American Free Trade Agreement. The EZLN seized several towns in Chiapas and fought the Mexican army for almost a week before a truce was agreed.
Government response
The interior minister, Santiago Creel, welcomed the Zapatistas' announcement. He said that there was now more chance of restarting negotiations since the government would be dealing with a peaceable political group rather an a military one. Negotiations between successive governments and the Zapatistas have been stalled, effectively, since February 1996.
Creel applauded the decision by the Zapatistas to abandon their roadblocks and their `revolutionary taxation' of passing motorists. More importantly he also welcomed the commitment from the Zapatistas to respect the rights of dissidents in the communities they control.
To the fury of rightwingers, Creel added that there was nothing unconstitutional in the Zapatistas' claim that the municipalities it controlled were autonomous. The right claims that the Zapatisats are setting up the equivalent of Bantustans. They point out that the 30 municipalities cover about a third of Chiapas. It also points out that the Zapatistas did not ask the inhabitants if they wanted to become part of an autonomous municipality nor did they present people with a choice of options.
The Zapatistas say that the municipalities will be funded by a brotherhood tax. This is, apparently, a flat 10% tax on all dealings in the municipalities. Ironically, the tax will, apparently, be levied on food and medicine. In the federal congress, the right points out, the left has fought a rearguard action to prevent the government from extending VAT (admittedly 15%) to food and medicine.
Creel's conciliatory words were endorsed by José Narro, currently the chairman of the congressional Comisión de Concordia y Pacificación. He said that the autonomy of indigenous people was guaranteed by article 169 of the International Labour Organisation.
Luis H. Alvarez, the government's peace commissioner for Chiapas, and a politician with a long record of campaigning for more democracy in Mexico, dismissed sneers from his (and the President's) party, the Partido Acción Nacional, about Marcos. He said that the crucial point about Marcos was that he was addressing a major problem for Mexico, which was the marginalisation of its indigenous people. A PAN spokesman had dismissed Marcos as the last of the great Mexican caciques.
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