Zeta: Interview with Doctor José Manuel Mireles Valverde

Translated by Yaqui for Borderland Beat from: ZETA

               Dr. Mireles has put down the weapons and now seeks to "awaken consciences ".

After spending almost three years in prison, José Manuel Mireles rules out re-leading an armed movement. Now, the 59-year-old doctor travels the country collecting money to free 258 self-defense groups who are still imprisoned; meets with organized groups of civil society and criticizes the ruling class. Question: "Or do you conceive that a poor nation has billionaire rulers?"

José Manuel Mireles Valverde has changed short sleeve shirts and jeans for a dark suit and tie, but retains his traditional black hat. He is about to enter a gala dinner in Tijuana, where dozens of people await him.

As he has done in other cities, that night he will offer a talk, he will dedicate copies of his book to the assistants, with whom he will live some hours. The money raised will finance the legal defense of 258 self-defense groups that remain incarcerated in Mexico.

That's what Dr. Mireles is doing now. After spending two years and eleven months in prison, accused of carrying guns along with 69 members of his self-defense group, he ruled out re-heading an armed movement.

"I continue to build trenches and not just in Michoacán, but throughout the nation. No longer nothing more armed, it is not needed, now my trenches are with university students, academics, workers' organizations, peasants, " he said in an interview with ZETA .

The 59-year-old doctor regained his freedom on May 12, 2017, the day after a long legal fight, he was granted the benefit of bail, but during the time he was in prison he suffered three pre-infarctions and a heart attack. .

"The day I left the captivity, I professionally considered that I had fifteen days to live. I was wrong for three days, on May 24 I was already in Cardiology in Mexico, with a sudden attack, " he recalls.

"The solution is never for peoples to arm themselves," now says the doctor.

After more than a year,  Dr. Mireles is recovered. Having been acquitted of the crimes that led to his imprisonment, his case was closed, but nine of the men who were detained with him in a federal operation carried out in Lázaro Cárdenas, Michoacán, are still being held.

Although some of them had already obtained their freedom under bail, they were returned to prison when accused of stealing wire from a fence or because of errors in their homes, the doctor said.

Here the interview of Dr. Mireles with ZETA :

- In Mexico, is a self-defense more pursued than a narco?

"Sure, I saw them inside the federal prison. 90 % of the inmates are not criminals, they are victims, those who must be imprisoned are their employers, those who ordered them to commit a crime, but those are not prisoners because they are the ones who eat breakfast with the authorities and that is why they never touch or see the inside of the jail."

However, for the former leader of the self-defense groups, a narco is not the same as a criminal. The distinction, from his reasoning, is that "a drug dealer is a provider of foreign currency, there are communities that have schools, drainage, electric light thanks to what you call narco ".

- So, how do you call them?

"Since man left caverns and forests, the world was divided into two social classes, the civilized and the barbarians. The civilized learned to till the land to put up the seed, to ensure their food through work. The barbarians were hidden in the mountains, the ravines or behind the walls, waiting for the harvest to be ready so they can steal it. Now they are not civilized or barbarians, they are productive people and work with organized crime. Do you know some organized crime wretch who works? They have never worked a day in their fucking life, they are watching, how much they are earning and the day they are going to harvest they kill them for their fortnight ( quincena = bi-monthly salary, usual type of payment arrangement for many Mexican workers), even if it is 1,000 pesos.

"I am not a narco, nor do I agree with the illegal practices of the people who are dedicated to that, but unfortunately, thanks to that, there are entire towns that can eat."

- Does the country's economic model have to change so that the narco stops fulfilling these functions?

"Simply and sensible yes , the authorities should carry out its work, that it detains all the sons of  bitches who only dedicate themselves to stealing and killing for money. Among the best institutions established in the nation to provide security to the people, there is organized crime and more crime. "

- What is the role you play now?

"Awaken consciences, nothing more. Yes today, everyone, from all social levels, universities, academics, workers, farmers, day laborers, ranchers, agriculturists, entrepreneurs, if we start by awakening consciences, first inside our homes, then in our work places, in our schools, in our neighborhoods, streets, neighbors, compadres, relatives, friends, a time will come when we do not have to sell our soul to the devil, if we want to live well or live in a nation in peace. "

- Enrique Peña Nieto is months away from the end of his Presidency, what is the balance left?

"More than 138,000 murders in his period, more than 134,000 disappeared. More than 40,000 displaced families and still the very wretched, 90 days left until he leaves, and he still takes out a loan of $10 billion dollars, for what ?,  he is not even leaving a stable or solid health system. How is it possible for a magistrate to earn 600,000 pesos a month while a worker can take a house of 600,000 pesos to pay for it in twenty years? Or do you conceive that a poor nation has billionaire rulers? No, all that has to change. For that we voted;  32,000,000 Mexicans. "

- Do you think then that Andrés Manuel López Obrador can change that panorama?

"Not only he, we Mexicans are the ones who seek that change. We already achieved our first victory in the election, the gentleman does not have any magic wand to solve the problems of the nation, but he has the Mexicans that we want the change. I believed in him and I still believe in him. The change comes and goes hard. It is going to shake all the strata of society that were accustomed to rob the nation without working one day or giving anything in return to the country. "

- You already mentioned the more than 130,000 homicides and disappearances, but do you think it is possible in terms of the relatives, of the victims, to give them justice? Can it be healed?

"Of course. If each citizen, in the activity that we have to develop, we do what belongs to us. That the magistrates, ministers and judges do their constitutional work, the public ministries, that the municipal police do and do not associate with organized crime to fuck the citizen, that everyone does their work and things do change. If constitutionally and based on Mexican jurisprudence, no Mexican citizen should be prosecuted or prosecuted when being detained far from his place of origin, but close to his family and friends to facilitate social reintegration. I asked the judge why they sent the Michoacanos to Sonora or why they sent the Yaquis from Sonora to Yucatan?,  Who are the main violators of the Law and of Justice in this country? Those forced to enforce and enforce it, that is what has to change. Others can do the job as the police to take care of your neighborhood and your neighborhood, others can do the work of the best judges in Mexico. They have already demonstrated that their corruption is not only physical, it is intellectual, it is moral ".

                                                                      Gala in Tijuana, BC

- When did you realize that this transition was necessary? No longer to be armed or in the villages, but to leave ...

"Never, never the solution is that the civilians arm themselves to defend themselves, that's what the institutions are for, but since they never did it, we had to do it. I am fully aware that what we did was not right, but it was the only thing we could do if we wanted to stay alive. I do not care about property or productivity, but life. We have self-defenses in 23 states of the Republic, they do not necessarily have to arm themselves, they have to defend themselves, but if necessary, they have to do what is necessary. When justice is contravened by law, justice must prevail even if it comes out of the hands of the same people. "

Violence, An Institutional Problem:

Through Fundación Mireles, the former leader of the self-defense groups has visited states such as Oaxaca, Zacatecas and Querétaro, as well as Mexico City to give lectures on the self-defense groups.

So he came to Baja California, where in addition to holding private meetings with activists and businessmen in Tecate, Rosarito and Tijuana, he presented his book "Todos Somos Autodefensas: El Despertar de un Pueblo Dormido", in which Mireles narrates the struggle he started in Michoacán in 2013.

Since then, the surgeon became a symbol of civil resistance to the power of organized crime and in the shadow of the government. Not only at the events that he appears people  approach to ask for a photograph, during the interview a woman recognizes him and shouts at him to greet him at a distance.

Others even take selfies with the doctor in the background, no matter if he is busy in an interview, in the middle of a conversation or signing a book.

After three days in Tijuana and hours before his flight leaves, Doc Mireles still has time to attend this interview and talk with those who approach him, either to share his admiration, present projects and even to contribute money for his foundation. This is the case in almost every city that visits.

During the interview,  D. Mireles talks about a town of 6,000 inhabitants in Morelos to explain why the public assumes the tasks of public safety. "He was reviled, destroyed, exploited by thirty guys who are not even Mexican, extorting, kidnapping and executing people until they hung one of the extortionists on the flagpole. They had warned that the ''delinquent we stop will be lynched'' and they did not believe it. If there is no one to defend them and the people decide that this is their only solution, they will do it and nobody will stop them. That is why the institutions must fulfill their obligation. "

- In the states that you have visited, what is the common denominator that triggers insecurity, violence?


"Across the nation, it's an institutional problem.

What was our war cry in Michoacán, after assassinations, kidnappings, dismemberments, rapes to our women ?: we ask for  efficient public security, a fair administration of justice that does not exist in the whole nation. Today there are 27 PRI bandit governors who looted the citizens, who gave the children the tap water in the chemotherapy to cheat all the money away and claimed that the chemists had cost them dearly. Don Gerardo, from Nayarit, who was put in jail for six years for stealing four cans of tuna to feed his children and the same day he entered prison; then there is the guy who stole 8 billion pesos from the Bank of Mexico and deposited a bond of  $7,000,000 dollars so that he would not be put in jail ... 

Is justice just for those who fucked us over? "

Note: I am reading this book right now, fantastic back round of the eternal fights indigenous peoples have had to endure forever including his own personal family history.