by Laura Gallegos
The Chicana and Chicano Studies Department the Mexican State Violence & Resistance: a conversation with Nestora Salgado and Felicitas Martinez Solano.
Nestora Salgado was wrongly incarcerated by the Mexican police in the state of Guerrero for protesting against the cartels and wrongdoing by the government to the indigenous people of the land.
She was jailed for two years and eight months. She was denied the right to a lawyer and from seeing anyone for a whole nine months. “I was treated worse than any criminal. We all know who el Chapo is, he had a lawyer right by his side and was treated with decency. Ms. Salgado was treated like she had committed the worst possible crime,” Ms. Salgado said. Ms. Salgado commented on how the Mexican government could falsely fabricate criminals and crimes they did to her in attempts to convict her of a more serious crime.
Protests for her arrest were ongoing and even ended up being delegated in front of the UN where they deemed her arrest to violate her human rights. Upon release, she decided to use this experience as motivation to spread awareness of what is going on in Mexico, “Narco-politics” and the state of Guerrero in its self. Ms. Salgado commented on how the Mexican government could falsely fabricate criminals and crimes they did to her in attempts to convict her of a more serious crime.
The second speaker Felicitas Martinez Solano talked in depth of the land being taken from them as part of Plan Merida and how the United States directly plays a key role in the atrocities occurring in Mexico.
The Whitsett Room was filled with students that were interested in Ms. Salgado and Ms. Martinez Solano experience. Audience members asked questions about their presentation. Ms. Salgado and Ms. Martinez Solano asked the audience to please support their cause and make changes happen through our own government by demanding answers and demanding change in attitudes towards what is occurring in Mexico because it could have been our uncle, aunt, father, mother, sister, brother, etc. affected by this.
