[CISPES-Update] President Funes Asks for State Pardon on 30th Anniversary of Romero Assassination

[CISPES National Office]

President Funes Asks for State Pardon on 30th Anniversary of Romero
Assassination


 


 





“If they kill me, I will be reborn in my people’s struggle.”


 


 


CISPES <http://www.cispes.org/>  Update


April 1, 2010

 

Included in this update:


 


*	Impunity Reigns in Trial over <>  Murdered Environmental Activist 
*	National University Re-opens <>  after Two-week Student Occupation

 

For the first time ever on Wednesday, March 24, the Salvadoran State,
represented by the country’s first leftist president Mauricio Funes, honored
the life of Monseñor Oscar Arnulfo Romero and apologized for its role in his
murder on the 30th anniversary of his assassination by State-linked death
squad agents.  Monseñor Romero, Archbishop of San Salvador, is revered by
Salvadorans for his ministry, his unflinching advocacy for El Salvador’s
poor majority and open condemnation of US-funded repression by the right
wing Salvadoran government, which resulted in his assassination on March 24,
1980 (listen to a BBC segment on Romero’s life and memory here
<http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p006lyl2> ).  

 

President Funes apologized for the government
<http://www.elfaro.net/es/201003/noticias/1416/> ’s role in Romero’s
martyrdom at a public ceremony to unveil a new mural dedicated to Romero at
the Comalapa Airport.  "I ask forgiveness in the name of the Salvadoran
State for this assassination, perpetrated 30 years ago, firstly from his
family, secondly from the Salvadoran people and thirdly from the Catholic
Church and religious organizations,” declared Funes.  Monseñor Romero’s
brother, Gaspar Romero, formally accepted the long-awaited government
apology responding, “With humility, love and gratitude, I accept this
request for pardon, even though it comes 30 years later.” The President also
announced plans for additional “moral and symbolic” State reparations for
Romero’s assassination, including a video about Romero’s life and work,
constructing a plaza in his name and promoting March 24 as National Monseñor
Romero Day, officially instituted as a national holiday by Legislative
Assembly vote this past March.

 

In addition to the State-sponsored events, civil society coalitions
organized a number of activities including an all-night vigil, a
“pilgrimage” and a demonstration.  On Saturday, March 20, thousands of
Salvadorans and internationals converged on the Metropolitan Cathedral in
San Salvador for an overnight vigil in honor of Romero, a celebration full
of music, dance and personal testimony. On March 24, in addition to the
massive pilgrimage in honor of Romero that wound through San Salvador,
people demonstrated at the statue of Major Roberto D’Aubuisson - the
intellectual author of Romero’s assassination and founder of the right wing
ARENA party (the Nationalist Republican Alliance).  Demonstrators threw
shoes at the statue, painted the word “murderer” on it and drew dead bodies
on the ground surrounding the monument.  This act of protest was intended to
highlight the violent roots of the ARENA party and the lack of justice for
the victims of State-sponsored repression.


 


Impunity Reigns in Trial over Murdered Environmental Activist 


 

On March 15th the Sensuntepeque Sentencing Court, in the department of
Cabañas, absolved Oscar Menjívar of all charges in connection to the
attempted murder of anti-mining activist Ramiro Rivera.  The ruling was made
while members of the Cabañas Environmental Committee (CAC) rallied for
justice outside the courthouse (read the statement
<http://esnomineria.blogspot.com/2010/03/comunicado-de-prensa.html>  by the
National Roundtable against Metallic Mining on the ruling).  The trial
addressed a murder attempt that took place in August of 2009 when Ramiro
Rivera, Vice President of the CAC, was shot 8 times in the back and
survived.  Rivera identified his attacker as Oscar Menjívar whom community
members say worked as a paid promoter for the Canadian mining company
Pacific Rim.  Four months later Rivera
<http://www.cispes.org/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=648&Itemid=
27>  was murdered by gunmen on his way home from fishing.

 

People who attended the trial noted serious irregularities in the process.
Menjívar, known by his neighbors to have limited financial resources, was
represented by a team of lawyers from El Salvador’s four most prestigious
law firms – raising the question of who was financing his defense.
Witnesses also report that one of the tribunal judges slept through a
significant portion of the trial.  According to the Rivera family’s lawyer,
the tribunal recognized that there was significant evidence pointing to
Menjívar’s guilt, but it ruled “not guilty” because the principal eyewitness
– Rivera himself, murdered last December – was not present to testify
against Menjívar.

 

The CAC has denounced the ruling as an act of impunity, declaring, “In
Sensuntepeque it is not strange that the innocent [who are poor] are put in
prison and the criminals that are supported [financially] or that have money
go free
This is a great challenge for those of us that live in the
threatened communities, threatened first by the mining projects and also by
the supporters of this mining company called Pacific Rim.”

 


National University Opens after Two-week Student Occupation


 

On Wednesday, March 3, a group of high school students who were denied
admission to the University of El Salvador (UES) shut down the San Salvador
campus and demanded over 500 new slots for the incoming class.  University
Dean Rufino Quezada announced that he would “not negotiate with masked
students” and called for police to unchain the gates and arrest the aspiring
university students, an act that would directly violate the legal autonomy
of the UES.  Minister of Security Manuel Melgar refused the dean’s request
and encouraged the university administration to exhaust all avenues of
negotiation. After almost 2 weeks, the occupation ended on March 16
following mediation by Human Rights Ombudsman Oscar Luna between the
aspiring students and the administration, and without police intervention.

 

The problem of limited space for incoming students has been a source of
increasing conflict at the UES since 2000.  The organized student movement
considers the general problem of accessibility to be in violation of the
constitutional right to education.  However, this year’s conflict divided
the university movement into two blocks: one block of 5 student
organizations supporting the occupation of the UES and the demand for mass
admission; and a second block of 20+ organizations (including the Roque
Dalton University Front, FURD) that consider the issue of university access
to be a question of funding and resources, which must be first addressed
before increasing student admission numbers in a responsible fashion.  

 

After Quezada called for police intervention, the second university block
held peaceful demonstrations outside the UES, calling on the occupying
students to re-open the campus while also demanding that the police refrain
from entering the university.  According to members of the FURD, this second
block negotiated with the administration during the occupation and
eventually reached an agreement that every university department, in
cooperation with students, would admit more students based on departmental
capacity and that the UES administration would create a permanent table of
dialogue to address this issue.  These are the same terms that aspiring
students and the administration agreed to on March 16.  Members of the FURD
went on to compliment the Funes Administration and Minister Melgar on
managing the occupation prudently.

 

 

 

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