Article by PBI-Canada

Photo by Emmanuel Ruiz/El Sol de Cuautla of the mass at the Cuautla River.

On January 18, El Sol de Cuernavaca reported: “About 15 vehicles and a group of cyclists from Mexico City departed this Sunday morning from the community of Huexca, in the municipality of Yecapixtla, as part of the Caravan for life and water.”

“The mobilization was convened by the Peoples Front in Defense of the Land and Water of Morelos, Puebla and Tlaxcala (FPDTA-MPT) against the operation of the Integral Morelos Project (PIM) and its thermoelectric plant in this town of Yecapixtla.”

The Morelos Integral Project (PIM) consists of a 171-kilometre gas pipeline that would cross the states of Morelos, Puebla and Tlaxcala, the Huexca plant  and a 12-kilometre aqueduct that would divert water from the Cuautla River.

That article adds that the caravan included a protest outside the thermoelectric plant, a religious service on shore of the Cuautla River in the community of San Pedro Apatlaco, and a last stop in the community of Tenextepango.

Noting the first stop, La Jornada adds: “Some activists got out of their vehicles and deployed a blanket with the faces of General Emiliano Zapata and Samir Flores Soberanes, an opponent of the PIM killed in February 2019, at the entrance of the CFE complex.”

On the second stop, Teresa Castellanos Ruiz of the FPDTA-MPT explained: “It is a mass because the spirit of the water is alive and we have to defend water and life. It is very important that this blessing of the Cuautla River, so that the authorities can learn to value the water, to defend it, not to allow it to be taken away because then they will not survive.”

The FPDTA-MPT has also stated: “[Mexican president] Lopez Obrador [support for the PIM] betrays the peasant and the promise of change of his government, to favour transnational corporations [including] Canadian miners like Alamos Gold.”

Toronto-based Alamos Gold has reactivated work on their Esperanza open-pit gold mine near the community of Tetlama (60 kilometres west of Huexca). Their statement suggests that this mine could draw energy from the plant.

PBI-Mexico began to accompany the FPDTA-MPT in 2020.

Photo by Rubicela Morelos/La Jornada of the first stop of the January 17 caravan.