[Imc-birmingham] Indy Oaxaca tour feature proposal

[phunkee]

Hi List, just put this on the newswire, it's just the text from the Indy 
Oaxaca tour but i'd like to turn it into a feature, maybe with something 
about the imcista Brad Will who was murdered in Oaxaca:

Indymedia Oaxaca Info-night comes to Birmingham

<p>An IndyOaxaca compañero who is indigenous to the mixe territory of <a 
href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oaxaca">Oaxaca</a> and an avid 
community radio, video and print and independent media activist with <a 
href="http://mexico.indymedia.org/oaxaca">Indymedia Oaxaca</a> is coming 
to talk and show films in Birmingham on Wednesday 16th May @ Rooty 
Frooty at Digbeth's Custard Factory from 7pm - 9pm.</p>

<p>2006 was a tumultuous year in Mexico and there is still no end in 
sight. Above stands a highly contested presidential election and from 
below there is a Zapatista campaign to focus the grassroots, 
anti-capitalist Left all over the country.</p>

<p>The annual teachers strike in the south-eastern Mexican city of 
Oaxaca and the subsequent movement protests became the largest popular 
rebellion in over a decade. Then, hundreds of illegal detentions, 
disappearances and injuries, and at least eighteen documented deaths 
followed.</p>

<p>2006 was a tumultuous year in Mexico and there is still no end in 
sight. Above stands a highly contested presidential election and from 
below there is a Zapatista campaign to focus the grassroots, 
anti-capitalist Left all over the country.</p>

<p>The annual teachers strike in the south-eastern Mexican city of 
Oaxaca and the subsequent movement protests became the largest popular 
rebellion in over a decade. Then, hundreds of illegal detentions, 
disappearances and injuries, and at least eighteen documented deaths 
followed.</p>

Read more about the <a href="/en/actions/2006/oaxaca/">Oaxaca 
Uprising</a> pages on Indymedia UK

<p>In Oaxaca, a broad-based movement to unseat an unpopular and corrupt 
governor turned into a grassroots uprising for direct democracy. For 
months, hundreds of residents in the half million people City and 
surrounding area took part in and maintained more than 1,000 street 
barricades, protest camps, occupations of government buildings as well 
as the literal takeover of mainstream media outlets. Mexico's federal 
government later sent in thousands of militarized police to crack down 
on the popular uprising and prop up the regime of the status quo. Taking 
part in all of these events is a lively independent media movement . . .</p>

<p> We will screen short films and hear straight from the horse's mouth 
the reasons behind last year's events in Oaxaca, bad governments, land 
struggles, exploitation, migration, the destruction of the environment, 
the continuing annihilation of indigenous cultures, ways of life and in 
mexico, their eternal refusal to conveniently make way to projects like 
the <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plan_Puebla_Panama">Plan 
Puebla Panama</a> and disappear for the benefit of the rich and for “the 
North”. We will look at what this means, to
be indigenous, to be autonomous, to be rebellious, to organize and 
resist. Resist dams, roads and agribusiness, biodiesel plantations or 
corporate T.V. We will update on the Zapatista Army of National 
Liberation (EZLN) campaign of continuing resistance, and look into 
European and UK involvement in the area, dissect it and draw parallels 
with local plans and struggles, community organisation and independent 
media. We expect people's involvement and hopefully we'll get to look 
inside our own reality, actions and beyond...</p>