Monthly Update

The race for the Presidency of El Salvador officially began on November 21. For all intents and purposes, however, the campaign began many months prior. The main battle is between the Alianza Republicana Nacionalista (ARENA) party and the Frente Farabundo Marti para la Liberación Nacional (FMLN), with the Partido Democráta Cristiano – Centro Democrático Unido (PDC-CDU) coalition and the Partido de Conciliación Nacional (PCN) trailing a distant third and fourth in the polls.

On December 4, the Foundation for the Study of the Application of the Law (FESPAD) released its “Annual Report of Legislative and Judicial Monitoring of Economic, Social and Cultural Rights, 2003.” The document is the first of it’s kind to be released by the organization. The report cites deficiencies in the protection of economic, social and cultural rights, which the authors attribute to both a lack of will on the part of the Judicial and Legislative branches, as well as a lack of coordination and cooperation between all three branches of government.

On December 10 students at the University of El Salvador closed off the campus in protest of the Central American Free Trade Agreement (CAFTA). The act, carried out in conjunction with marches and protests around the country, was coordinated to overlap with the final round of CAFTA negotiations in Washington DC. Aside from the damage it will visit on the national economy, some students fear ratification of the trade agreement could facilitate eventual privatization of the National University.

Six Spanish students from the Center for Exchange and Solidarity attended the December 13 commemoration of the 1981 massacre in the town of El Mozote. Now one of the most widely known examples of the human cost of U.S. policy in El Salvador, the commemoration continues to draw a substantial number of international attendees.

Wilfredo Valencia Palacios Roman passed away on the morning of November 29 from AIDS complicated Tuberculosis. Wilfredo was a longtime solidarity activist in San Francisco and former coordinator of the Political Cultural Program at the Center for Exchange and Solidarity. His adoptive mother, Norma Roman, recounts his contribution to the world.

I . Race for the Presidency Well Underway

A pamphlet distributed by the Alianza Republicana Nacionalista (ARENA) party features a prominent quote from Presidential Candidate Antonio Elias Saca that is at once intriguing and telling.

“Today, I accept this challenge because I am more convinced than ever that El Salvador is worth it,” reads Saca’s quote. “I am sure that as Salvadorans, we will vote for security, not for instability; for openness, not for isolation; for peaceful co-existence, not for class hatred; and for work, not for violence.”

To anyone versed in Salvadoran politics and history, it is obvious to whom Saca is attributing the characteristics of instability, isolation, class hatred and violence. He is referring to ARENA’s main political opposition, the Frente Farabundo Marti para la Liberación Nacional (FMLN).

Although the presidential race officially started on November 21, for all intents and purposes it began many months prior. The main battle is between the governing ARENA party and the FMLN, with the Partido Democráta Cristiano – Centro Democrático Unido (PDC-CDU) coalition and the Partido de Conciliación Nacional (PCN) trailing a distant third and fourth in the polls.

Founded in 1981 by Legislative Assembly member and accused death-squad organizer Major Roberto D’Abuisson,[1] ARENA has established itself as the strongest party on the political right. ARENA has held the presidency since 1989.

ARENA presidential candidate Tony Saca only recently released the official outline of his campaign platform. The delay was due in part to pre-campaign tour of 262 municipalities around El Salvador. The “Great National Consultation” was entitled “Hablemos Con Libertad” (translated as “Let’s Speak with Liberty”), a thinly veiled stab at what ARENA asserts are the FMLN’s “communist” authoritarian tendencies.

Saca says that his government will focus on 16 different areas, among them, public health system reform, public spending reduction, and support for micro, small and medium enterprises. The ARENA candidate has also promised to make more stringent the two-month-old Anti-Gang Law, already denounced by many as unconstitutional.

After fifteen years of ARENA control of the executive, and an economic crisis that only seems to be deepening, it is unclear how Saca’s plan differs from that of his three predecessors. Under the administration of the current President Francisco Flores, “reform” of healthcare was interpreted by most within the medical field as a plan for privatization. And although Saca has pledged to support micro, small and medium enterprises, there is wide concern within that sector about the potentially negative impact of the Central American Free Trade Agreement (CAFTA), for which ARENA and Saca have pledged their support.

In ARENA political literature, however, discussion of the party platform appears to have been outweighed by vague references to the FMLN penchant for violence and instability. A booklet distributed by the party featured a page-by-page comparison with the FMLN claiming, among other things, that the FMLN does not believe in God and supports terrorists.

For their part, the FMLN has blamed ARENA for the dire social and economic situation the country currently finds itself in. The FMLN attributes this to ARENA’s steadfast adherence to neo-liberal economics, and has positioned itself as the alternative to the current system. The party has laid out a platform that seeks to overturn many of the neo-liberal initiatives executed by the past three ARENA administrations.

Formally established as a political party 1992, after it’s guerrilla members were demobilized as part of the peace accords, the FMLN has maintained its leftist political stance. Presidential Candidate Schafik Handal is a longtime leader within the party. Vice Presidential Candidate Guillermo Mata is President of the Medical College of El Salvador, and was a key leader of the 9-month medical worker strike against privatization of public health.

The FMLN platform advocates implementation of measures to prevent future privatization of state enterprises, as well as the revision of privatizations executed to date. The platform also calls for revising certain tariff protection for domestic agricultural products, lowering the consumer cost of water, telephone service and electricity, raising the urban and rural minimum wage, and creating a National Development Bank to facilitate access to credit and other financial services for small and medium enterprises.

The FMLN plan proposes addressing delinquency by punishing offenders but also investing in preventative and rehabilitative programs for criminals, especially members of youth gangs.

The third and fourth largest parties seem barely in the running. The PDC-CDU coalition, created in September 2003 with former San Salvador Mayor Hector Silva as presidential candidate, positions itself as country’s political center. Silva and his Vice Presidential candidate, Ana Cristiana Sol, represent a wedding of two extremes. Silva was elected mayor of San Salvador twice on an FMLN ticket, while Sol served in the ARENA administrations of Alfredo Cristiani and Armando Calderón Sol.

The coalition’s relatively small margin of support is an apt reflection of the extent to which post-war El Salvador remains a polarized society. Silva and Sol say their administration will focus on greater investment in health care and education, government decentralization, and activation of the rural economy. Silva has maintained an amicable relationship with the United States Embassy in El Salvador, and agreed not to support the FMLN should the presidential elections reach a second round.

Founded in 1961 after a military coup that installed a “civil-military junta”, the PCN has largely been supplanted by ARENA. The party has chosen Legislative Assembly Deputy Rafael Machuca as their presidential candidate. Machuca has cited revitalization of the agricultural sector, as well as the modernization of industry and the State as central to his platform.

With the first round of elections set for March 21, 2004, public polling has begun with rigor. On Thursday, December 4 La Prensa Grafica published statistics from a poll conducted by the Guatemalan firm TNS Data, which showed the FMLN with 25 percent support and ARENA with 40 percent. The PDC-CDU and PCN trailed far behind with 6 and 1 percent respectively.

A poll publicized on December 15 by the University Institute of Public Opinion (IUDOP) at the Central American University “José Simeón Cañas,” however, shows ARENA in the lead, but with the FMLN steadily gaining.

People were still trickling in the door of the Presentation Room 4 in San Salvador’s Marriott Hotel at 4:30 p.m., when Lissette Campos began her presentation. Representatives of various non-governmental organizations, no doubt having excused themselves from work early, quietly took seats in the back of the room.

Campos, Coordinator of the Human Rights Department at the Foundation for the Study of the Application of the Law (FESPAD), was one of three speakers charged with presenting the findings of a report released by that organization on December 4. Entitled, “Annual Report of Legislative and Judicial Monitoring of Economic, Social and Cultural Rights, 2003,” the document is the first of its kind to be released by FESPAD. In organization’s assessment, the Judicial and Legislative branches of the Salvadoran government need to undergo some reforms before they can count themselves among the country’s defenders of Human Rights.

“We would like the population in general to know in a systematic fashion how the Supreme Court rules on cases using or not using human rights standards,” says Campos. She adds that it is also FESPAD’s desire that the public know, “how the Legislative Assembly modifies or does not modify laws using human rights criteria.”

The initial part of the document is devoted to Legislative Assembly monitoring conducted between January and August 2003. The authors of the report summarize their assessment of the Assembly as “incapable of generating policies that have as their base a recognition and development of humans as the beginning and end of all their activity, as they are obligated by the constitution.”[2]

The document describes favorably some of the measures approved by the Legislative Assembly, in so far as they attempt to compensate for deficiencies in other areas of the Salvadoran government. Many of these measures, however, were approved as stipulations for international loan money. FESPAD points out that this increases the public debt, the bill for which is then passed on to the citizens.

Perhaps even more interesting, however, is FESPAD’s observation that some measures passed by the Legislative Assembly, which would have furthered economic, social, and cultural rights in El Salvador, were vetoed by the Executive branch. They attribute this to a failure on the part of all three branches of the government to promote social policies, as well as a lack of coordination and cooperation between them.

“It is evident that the Legislative Assembly has not adopted the legislative measures necessary for the full effectiveness of [Economic, Social and Cultural Rights], in a sense, they have not adopted measures that assure the consolidation of comprehensive social policies,” concludes the report.[3]

The assessment of the Judicial branch resonates with that of the Legislative. FESPAD asserts that mechanisms designed to protect the right of citizens have been weakened to such an extent that they presently constitute little more than formal processes.[4]

“One objective is that the Supreme Court as well as the [Legislative] Assembly feel that they are being monitored,” says Campos. “We hope this will prompt them to assess themselves and how they are acting.”

Notes:
[2] Fundación de Estudios para la Aplicación de Derecho (FESPAD). Informe annual de Monitoreo Legislativo y Judicial en Derechos Económicos, Sociales y Culturales, 2003. San Salvador, El Salvador: 20.

[3] Ibid: 22.

[4] Ibid: 47.

Anyone making their way past the University of El Salvador on the morning of Wednesday, December 10 was greeted by an unfamiliar sight: instead of students streaming into the University, hundreds were gathered just outside the campus’ arched entrances. The imposing black gates at each entrance were shut and locked.

Even from a distance, the banners that had been strung across the iron bars were visible, making clear the purpose behind the closing. One banner read in bold red letters, “Workers and students against TLC ALCA.”[5]

The seizure of the University of El Salvador was one of a series of acts realized throughout the country during the same week. The capital was host to both the University takeover and a march organized by the Movimiento Popular de Resistencia 12 de octubre (MPR-12). Planned to overlap with the ninth and final round of negotiations for the Central American Free Trade Agreement (CAFTA) in Washington, DC, the acts were organized to publicize discontent over possible ratification of the free trade agreement.

University employee Rosa Estrada noted that, to date, she had not detected a high level of opposition to CAFTA among the University administration, employees or student body.

“This is good,” she said. “All of the Latin American University Rectors are meeting here this week. They [the students and workers] are saying, ‘do something about this. You have power.’"

On Thursday, November 11, the students themselves stated in a press conference that the duration of the University takeover would depend on “the willingness of government to reject the free trade agreement."

The students made clear that the University takeover was not an isolated event. “This is in coordination with the social movement of El Salvador,” said one masked student.

The students identified the target of their protest as the White House and the ruling Alianza Republicana Nationalista (ARENA) party, who have been pushing to finalize the trade agreement negotiations before the end of the year.

The students also repudiated the apparent insinuation of University Rector María Isabel Rodriquez that the takeover had been violent, and that those responsible intended to damage the campus.

“We have closed the University peacefully,” noted one student. “There have not been any violent actions. The purpose is to protest the free trade agreement.”

“We love our University,” added the same student. “We are not going to damage it in any way. We have closed the gates and that is all.”

The takeover appears to have been at least in part motivated by current concerns over privatization of the University.

Citing what he considers to be mismanagement of university resources and concessions to powerful interests, Bloque Popular Juvenil (BPJ) student representative Salvador Oliverio Umaña said that the actions of the university rector to date “could be heading down the path toward privatization.”

Despite the initially indefinite duration of the takeover, students and workers who had staged the closing of the University left quietly sometime in the early hours of Friday morning. Their departure was ostensibly voluntary, but some student claim to have received news that the police were going to attempt to dislodge them.

Most took part in the march organized that day by MPR-12. Others, however, took part in a much smaller demonstration on one of San Salvador’s main arteries, Boulevard de Los Heroes.

While the larger march passed without incident, the smaller gathering on Boulevard Los de Heroes resulted in 20 arrests. The story made the front page of both of San Salvador’s major dailies, La Prensa Grafica and El Diario de Hoy, receiving more coverage than the larger protest organized by MPR-12.

Some of the attendees at the larger march expressed measured disapproval at their peer’s decision to stage a separate event.

“The majority were in the big march with the rural people,” says Oliverio Umaña. “The others made a personal decision. They held their own march.”

CAFTA was approved on December 17 by all the Central American States except Costa Rica. If actions carried out to date are any indication, however, resistance to the measure can be expected to continue.

“The neo-liberals have invaded all of the sectors,” emphasizes Christian Martinez. “They even want to privatize the water.”

Notes:
[5] The Central American Free Trade Agreement (CAFTA) is known in Spanish as the Tratado de Libre Comercio (TLC). The Free Trade Area of the Americas (FTAA) is known in Spanish as the Area de Libre Comercio de las Americas (ALCA).

The mid-afternoon sun was still strong as the small group of Spanish students gathered on the shady back patio of the Center for Exchange and Solidarity (CIS).

At 2:30 they gathered their belongings, just enough for one night, and headed for the door. They were going to catch public transportation to the town of Mercedes Umaña, in the Department of Usulutan. There they would spend the night before heading to the town of El Mozote the following day.

The students, accompanied by CIS Spanish teacher Álvaro Carias, attended the commemoration of a massacre that occurred in that small town called El Mozote, located in the northern department of Morazan. The December 1981 massacre, perpetrated by soldiers in the U.S. trained Atlcatl battalion of the Salvadoran Army, resulted in the deaths of an estimated 1,000 people.[6] It has become the most widely known example of the human cost of U.S. Cold War policy in El Salvador. Perhaps for that reason, its commemoration continues to draw a substantial number of international visitors.

“We got up early to go to Perquín,” recalls student Matt Hunt of the day following their depature. “We saw the Museum of the Revolution.”

Hunt remembered particularly vividly the wreckage of Lt. Colonel Domingo Monterrosa’s helicopter, on display at the Museum of the Revolution. Monterrosa, commanding officer of the Battalion responsible for the massacre at El Mozote, had his helicopter blown out of the sky on October 23, 1984 by FMLN guerrillas.

“On the way there we passed the regional military command center in San Miguel,” adds Hunt. “It is named the Monterrosa Command Center even to this day.”

The current town of El Mozote and the area it occupied during the massacre are set apart from each other. The remains of the old town are still littered with numerous reminders of what transpired there.

“It was very disturbing,” noted Hunt, mentioning the bullet holes apparent in the few walls that are still standing. “It had a haunted feeling.”

“Some one told us that when they originally uncovered the bones they were huddled in the corners of the houses,” said Spanish Student Shannon Strumpfer. “These people were obviously trying to run away from the gunfire.”

Strumpfer added that she was particularly impacted by seeing the tree that Mozote-resident Rufina Amaya hid under while her neighbors were shot en masse only three yards away.

The commemoration itself had a much different tone than might be expected, given the pain suffered by this community. “There were little kids playing around the Mozote memorial,” said Hunt. “It didn’t seem disrespectful,” he added, “it seemed hopeful.” The rest of the commemoration included music by a number of groups and dancing by local youth. Priests from the area also held a funeral for the recently exhumed remains of some children.

For obvious reasons, the commemoration at El Mozote continues to deeply impact attendees.

“It was especially amazing to me to be able to walk around to all the places I’ve heard about in my reading,” said Hunt, who authored a one-act play in 1992 based on massacre that occurred at El Mozote. He added that he feels his play to be all the more pertinent now given the Bush Administration’s “preemptive strike” foreign policy.

The process of re-population, the healing of old wounds, and the institutionalization of collective memory has certainly changed the community of El Mozote during the past 22 years. United States foreign policy has also changed, but as Hunt suggests, in other important ways perhaps it has not.

Wilfredo Valencia Palacios Roman, known to many as Wilito, was born in the Central Market of San Salvador to a mother with many children. He sold plantains, water, and whatever else he could to help support his mother, brothers and sisters from the age of 5. By 9 years old, he was collaborating with the Bloque Popular Revolucionario (BPR), carrying messages and attending activities. Although his mother was a follower of the Christian Democrats, he was an independent thinker who supported radical change from the start.

Against his will, he accompanied his mother and sister on the long journey to the United States in early 1980, shortly before his 12^th birthday. This was Willy’s first of many border crossings as an undocumented immigrant in the U.S.

Within a few days of arriving in San Francisco, he joined Casa El Salvador Farabundo Marti. Young Wilito, with his cachuca (baseball cap) and his giant ears sticking out, became a fixture in the Central America movement in San Francisco. No demonstration took place without him, and he was always the loudest of the bunch.

At age 15, he went to live in the Chilean exile community in San Jose California, and then made his way on his own to Mexico at age 16. There he lived in Puebla, in the Central Market, drawing on his skills from his childhood.

At age 17, he returned to San Francisco from Mexico and again hooked up with Casa Farabundo Marti. I had met him when he first arrived in San Francisco. At that time had just returned from leading a national health delegation to El Salvador for the Committee for Health Rights in Central America (CHRICA). Willy volunteered to transcribe the 40 hours of recorded interviews and meetings so that radio shows as well as reports for Congress and the media could be prepared.

Willy moved in with me to do the work, and by the time he finished we had agreed that I would be his second mother. He wanted a mom who understood both his revolutionary fervor and his need to dance the night away in a bar. He also wanted a mom who understood that a revolutionary could also be gay.

At that time Willy had begun to assume his gay identity, which was a difficult issue among many Central American companeros. As he began to come out, he began to make contact with gay organizations, and with people doing HIV prevention work. Willy couldn’t help but get involved. He collaborated with CURAS, a Latino community organization working with gay men and AIDS, and also continued with his work at Casa Farabundo Marti.

Willy, however, never liked living in the United States. In 1987, he returned to El Salvador for a while, and then moved back to Mexico, where he lived in Mexico City and worked with the Salvadoran refugee community. He did pantomime on the streets, and sold artesania to survive.

In 1988, he went to a blood bank to donate blood for the mother of a friend who had been hit by a car. When the doctor at the blood bank told Willy he couldn’t donate blood because he had AIDS, Willy’s response was tell him to return to school.

Shortly thereafter, however, Willy returned to the U.S. in order to start taking AZT, the only HIV medicine available at that time. He began working with Casa F.B. again on his return, as well as with AIDS prevention organizations. He also was “Tio Will” to a slew of nieces and nephews, who’s birthday parties he livened up with his incredible dancing and “joie de vivre”. Willy was always the life of the party, his smile lighting up the room.

Willy was nominated employee of the month for Project Open Hand, a food service agency for patients with AIDS. He started by working reception on a 10-line phone, and ended up coordinating volunteers. The young man who never went to school got his GED and learned to word process on computers. Still not happy living in the United States, however, he decided to return to El Salvador in the early 1990s.

Upon returning to El Salvador, Willy started the Oscar Romero AIDS Prevention Project, which distributed condoms received from friends in the U.S. Willy realized, however, that without self-esteem and a reason to live, his gay Salvadoran brothers weren’t interested in using condoms. In response he decided to start “self esteem groups” among the gays, transvestites and sex workers in the Central Market area.

Eventually Willy hooked up with some middle class activists at FUNDASIDA, the only clinic for AIDS patients in the country. Working with the people there, the group Entre Amigos was formed. Willy initiated and helped organize the first march against AIDS in El Salvador. He also helped to organize the first candlelight vigil with mantas (sheets displaying writing and images about the people who had died) inspired by the AIDS quilt.

Willy’s work grew. It grew to include efforts to change laws that discriminate against Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender (LGBT) people in El Salvador. He also worked with the Centro de Intercambio y Solidaridad (CIS) in San Salvador. He was also a tireless grassroots activist and leader of the FMLN in San Salvador’s Central Market.

In addition, he met with FMLN legislators and officials about initiating legal changes. He worked as a translator and tour guide with foreign delegations that came to study the political situation in El Salvador. He also returned to his roots and had a puesto or stand in the Central Market where he sold everything from fruit to toothpaste.

Over the years, Willy periodically returned to the United States for healthcare treatment. At times, people in the United States managed to send him medicines so that he could stay in El Salvador, where he wanted to continue his work. He was always taking care of his hundreds of sobrinos (nieces and nephews) in the market, providing support and love to them and their parents.

In 1994, members of a Salvadoran death squad threatened Willy, and told him to leave the country by the end of the month. He was beaten and shot at for his AIDS education work and efforts to promote tolerance for LGBT people. He laid low for a while, but he didn’t leave.

In 1996, a visitor from San Francisco made a video of some of Willy’s AIDS prevention outreach work in the market. Willy wanted to open a center that would provide a safe place for gay Salvadorans to organize and give each other support. The Centro Cultural Girasol opened in December of 1996. In April of 1997, I completed a 17 minute video documentary entitled “Entre Amigos: Founding the First Gay Cultural Center in El Salvador”. The video has since been shown in 22 international film festivals around the world, and has been used to obtain political asylum for gay Salvadorans in the U.S.

In September of 2000, Willy returned to the U.S. for medical treatment. Although he received political asylum, had a good job doing immigration advocacy and became healthy again, he chose to return to El Salvador. After his return in September of 2001, he worked with the FMLN committee in the Central Market, and collaborated with the CIS. Only a few weeks before he died, he told CIS Director Leslie Schuld, that, “I don’t want to go yet because I want to work on the FMLN’s campaign for the 2004 Presidential elections.”

The last outing Willy made was to the opening of the campaign in the Central Plaza of downtown San Salvador on the 22^nd of November. With his FMLN bandana, a walker, a chair, and me holding him up, he joined thousands of others as they looked to a better future for El Salvador. Only 2 days later, Willy could no longer walk and was hospitalized. One week later, on Saturday morning, he died.

His funeral the following Sunday was attended by over 150 people, mostly from the market, along with several CIS and FMLN compañeros. Two buses and a white hearse flying FMLN flags wound their way through the Mercado Central on the way to the cemetery. His coffin was draped with the flags of both his soccer team and the FMLN.

On Monday, December 1, the International Day against AIDS, Willy’s old lover and friend Cristian and I made a manta for him and took it to the vigil in the plaza.

At the event William Hernandez, another key activist in the Salvadoran gay community, spoke of Willy’s contribution. “If it weren’t for Wil, I wouldn’t be here today with my partner and my daughter, and this work would not exist. He started it all, and will always inspire us to continue.”

FMLN vice presidential candidate Dr. Guillermo Mata also spoke from the stage, recognizing the contribution Willy made, and expressing our sadness at the loss of a brave and committed compañero.

We know that Wilito isn’t gone. He will always be here in any work we do for justice and freedom.

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I. Race for the Presidency Well Underway

I . Race for the Presidency Well Underway