Acapatzingo: gift of popular power to the world
by redlatinasinfronteras. via thefreeonline at https://wp.me/pIJl9-G23 on 11th Feb 25…Francisco Villa Popular Tgram https://t.me/thefreeonline/2224
Defense Group
Víctor M. Toledo
jornada.com.mx/
11.02.25
Can what radical leftist thinkers of the 19th and 20th centuries dreamed of become a concrete and verifiable reality? The answer is yes and it has a name: Acapatzingo, a project carried out by the Francisco Villa Popular Organization of Independent Left in the heart of Iztapalapa, the most violent and dangerous area of Mexico City.
Cooperation, mutual aid and communality led a group of 600 families of social outcasts to take over nine hectares of vacant land by force in 1996, to build, maintain and reproduce an extraordinary collective project.
The first thing this group of poor families did was to delimit and control the entrance and exit of their territory. Today there are only two entrances under strict surveillance and everyone, including the municipal, state and federal governments, respect this decision of self-defense
Invited as part of a group of academics and leaders of organizations to visit the experience, for six hours I learned about what is undoubtedly the most important urban project of self-government, self-management and self-defense in the country. Acapatzingo forms an oasis of resistance and dignity with enormous political and civilizing repercussions that announce the path to follow for all humanity.
These are families of workers who work in various places in Mexico City, and who also carry out tasks in the cooperative they have created. Three entities maintain communal order: the general assembly, the brigades and commissions and the families. Each family abides by a regulation approved by the assembly and its respective sanctions, and carries out various tasks for the community.
EL BRINCO EN ACAPATZINGO – YouTube
Each family has a 130 square meter home: three bedrooms on the upper floor and a kitchen, living room and dining room on the ground floor. Each house is painted pink, lilac, green, tangerine, blue or yellow, as well as pots with plants and flowers in the front gardens (https://desinformemonos.org/acapatzingo-el-otro-mundo-en-medio-de-la-ciudad/).
This collective, which has been in existence for 29 years, has the following benefits: surveillance and security. A clinic that has been offering low-cost medicines since 2005, and addresses problems of all ages, including mental health.
For this reason, Covid-19 only infected 34 cooperative members out of almost 3,000 inhabitants, who were cared for and attended to by the collective.
An education and culture commission started in 2001 organizes workshops for children, events that reinforce collective awareness and has a library. Another commission dedicated to sports that promotes a non-competitive awareness and organizes workshops and various activities.
Of great importance is the communication commission that began with the use of loudspeakers and now has a Facebook page, as well as a press office in charge of propaganda and a community radio station called La Voz de Villa at 91.7 FM (https://opfvii.org/radio/).
La comisión de agricultura trabaja cotidianamente en el invernadero.
Water management includes rainwater collection for the subsoil, two water treatment plants that provide mineral-rich drinking water, and recycling grey water through a community cistern. There is also a solar energy project to heat water and produce electricity.
In addition, the community has five greenhouses, where the agriculture and agroforestry commission made up of 28 people grows and produces food, without agrochemicals and using vermicompost, such as chard, radishes, beets, tomatoes, onions, celery, cauliflower, chili peppers, medicinal plants and fruit trees. The commission already uses the concept of agroecology.
Finally, for five years the cooperative has had La Talega, a savings bank that aims to break with the monetary control of banks and the system, and give people in the community the possibility of accessing credit without so many problems.
La Otra Tamaulipas: La Mano con Mano en la Unidad Acapatzingo
This experience has also been extended to two other sites: Iztacalco in four buildings and a total of 180 families, and in Pantitlán adding another 360 families (see: https://opfvii.org/ ). In the end we are talking about a total of 1,140 families!
Awareness, mutual help and solidarity are the values that Acapatzingo launches as a challenge and example to be reproduced everywhere.
They have clearly and forcefully demonstrated that it is possible to build and maintain social, popular or citizen power, which we consider to be the way forward to overcome the tremendous crisis that the contemporary world is experiencing today. This is a model to be reproduced throughout the national territory (the next stage of the 4T?), but above all it is a gift to the world.
Jóvenes participan en la estación de radio comunitaria
source: https://www.jornada.com.mx/2025/02/11/politica/014a1pol
received from CENCOALT
Alternative Communication Center
http://cencoalt.blogspot.mx/ also edited and distributed from https://argentina.indymedia.org/ forwarded by enred_sinfronteras@riseup.net https://mastodon.bida.im/@RedLatinasinfronteras Share this: FacebookX Related Mexico: Ostula resists in defense of autonomy, self-determination and indigenous self-defense August 2, 2024 In «Autonomy» Kurdistan_The social revolution in Rojava: Libertarian communalism, democratic confederalism and Kurdish self-defense April 23, 2015 In «Resistances» Mexico_Michoacán_Santa María Ostula: Long live self-defense and communal self-government!
(PDF) Acapatzingo: construyendo comunidad urbana. El Frente Popular …academia.edu
(https://desinformemonos.org/acapatzingo-el-otro-mundo-en-medio-de-la-ciudad/).
The Free 