Independent media under attack in Oaxaca
Sevastopol | 07.09.2008 16:38 | Other Press | Repression | Social Struggles | World
Call to international action in defence of the free and community radio stations of Oaxaca, currently under attack from the government.
The community airwaves, free to all.
“We must defend the voices of our people”
On Friday 29 August, one day before the Assembly of the Free and Community Radios of Oaxaca, the report came in of the first dismantling of the inaccurately-named ‘pirate’ radio stations (those without government permission), in Huajuapam de León, under the pretext that it had been transmitting clandestinely in the community. The primary content of the radios is the defence of the human rights of participants of the Oaxacan social movement. Today we are informed that the evictions continue in the region of the Isthmus (of Tehuantepec). These radios were of a merely commerical nature, but we believe that the true aim of the federal government is to dismantle those radios with direct links to community process and obligations and links to the social struggle.
In the Isthmus region there are many instances of free and community communication media that count on the support and endorsement of the local community and whise programming reflects and contributes to community processes.
The Assembly of the Free and Community Radios of Oaxaca denounces the methods used by the government to send its hostile messages to our compañeros engaged in communicatory work in their regions, states and communities. Their intimidatory tactics make it very clear that they take their cue from their tyrannical system and the laws that uphold it, and not from the decisions of the community assemblies of the barrios and citizen councils. Communication that does not profit the powerful, is an irritation to them. For this reason we fight together to defend our legitimate right to inform and be informed.
It is now of vital importance to make a profound analysis of these attacks that the government is directing and attemping against community information projects and the messages they send to those of us who do not beg permission to be listened to or comunicate with those who do not recognise the laws and who look to community participation. We stand for the fight for communication at the service of our communities and for the autonomy for each of these spaces.
We hereby call on the people of Oaxaca, Mexico and the World to be alert to every action of the bad government against free and community media and to respond in an organised manner, mobilising in the streets in defence of our means of communication.
“For communication from the people”
V.O.C.A.L. Autonomous radio communication
“We must defend the voices of our people”
On Friday 29 August, one day before the Assembly of the Free and Community Radios of Oaxaca, the report came in of the first dismantling of the inaccurately-named ‘pirate’ radio stations (those without government permission), in Huajuapam de León, under the pretext that it had been transmitting clandestinely in the community. The primary content of the radios is the defence of the human rights of participants of the Oaxacan social movement. Today we are informed that the evictions continue in the region of the Isthmus (of Tehuantepec). These radios were of a merely commerical nature, but we believe that the true aim of the federal government is to dismantle those radios with direct links to community process and obligations and links to the social struggle.
In the Isthmus region there are many instances of free and community communication media that count on the support and endorsement of the local community and whise programming reflects and contributes to community processes.
The Assembly of the Free and Community Radios of Oaxaca denounces the methods used by the government to send its hostile messages to our compañeros engaged in communicatory work in their regions, states and communities. Their intimidatory tactics make it very clear that they take their cue from their tyrannical system and the laws that uphold it, and not from the decisions of the community assemblies of the barrios and citizen councils. Communication that does not profit the powerful, is an irritation to them. For this reason we fight together to defend our legitimate right to inform and be informed.
It is now of vital importance to make a profound analysis of these attacks that the government is directing and attemping against community information projects and the messages they send to those of us who do not beg permission to be listened to or comunicate with those who do not recognise the laws and who look to community participation. We stand for the fight for communication at the service of our communities and for the autonomy for each of these spaces.
We hereby call on the people of Oaxaca, Mexico and the World to be alert to every action of the bad government against free and community media and to respond in an organised manner, mobilising in the streets in defence of our means of communication.
“For communication from the people”
V.O.C.A.L. Autonomous radio communication
Sevastopol
e-mail:
sevastopol@riseup.net
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