El Frontón Prison
Every day we hear on bourgeois radio stations and read in the bourgeois press, both governmental and private, that like any other natural catastrophe, earthquakes pay no attention to class distinctions. We hear and read daily admonitions that in times like these we must forget all class differences.
I got part of my revolutionary education from being the victim of an earthquake (Cuzco, 1950). Because of my experience and as a member of the FIR [Frente de Izquierda Revolucionario — Front of the Revolutionary Left, the Peruvian section of the Fourth International], I feel obliged to say something about the present situation. This is especially so because this is, not the last time that we Peruvian revolutionists will be confronted with such a development. Since natural catastrophes are very frequent in our country, we should discuss the problem they raise.
Before talking about the results of the earthquake, we should remember that the geographer Edmundo Rey and many other Peruvian scientists have pointed to the French A-Bomb explosion in approximately the same latitude as the direct or possible cause of the earthquake (which caused 50,- 000 or more deaths and had a million direct victims, one-tenth of the total population of Peru). The earthquake came the day after the explosion. The official bodies, of course, have rejected this view, claiming that the earthquake coming after the bomb blast was just a "casual coincidence," like the other natural tragedies following directly in the wake of the previous French explosions.
The bourgeois companies and governments are using this tragedy to build up a demagogic campaign to show how "philanthropical" they are, offering a tiny fraction of the enormous sums they extract from the labor of the workers as "aid." Many companies which are known for their July 13, 1970
inhumanity to their employees are trying to put on a "humanitarian" appearance that would enable them to exploit their workers more effectively and thus get back the value of their "aid" with a nice profit besides.
The case of the Cerro de Pasco Copper Corporation is instructive. While this company is beating the drum about the aid it gave to repair a highway, it is obstructing the workers' desire to donate a day's wages. This practice was exposed by the union, which found itself forced to threaten a strike so that the workers could accomplish their intention.
The government of the United States also finds it convenient to present a humanitarian face, pointing out among other things that its helicopters are "saving lives" (the same helicopters it is using in the genocide in Indochina and which on another occasion would probably return to Peru to "save the life" of the capitalist system and imperialist domination). Nor are the Peruvian repressive forces missing the chance to gain some prestige. They are "helping" the people that they massacre any time they rise up against the exploiters. And France is sending us geologists!
Moreover, this tragedy is being exploited to the hilt by the exploiters to convince us that "we are all one," that "we must forget our resentments, and other such things. The junta's "leftist" servants are the first to call for a "moratorium on strikes."
But in contrast to this hypocrisy by those who feed on the people's distress is an attitude of real solidarity by the workers, students, and all the exploited sectors of the country, as well as our brothers in other countries.
The members of many unions have decided democratically to donate a day's wages to the earthquake victims. Medical and social-work students, the students of the Universidad Agraria and other schools, rushed to the disaster area, offering their knowledge and energy to help the suffering people. The high-school students have mobilized to carry out collections. The market workers have contributed food, as they did before to striking workers.
The poor of all sectors have taken the bread out of their own hungry mouths to send it to their brothers in the north. They have robbed their own miserable wardrobes to cover their brothers, at the cost of exposing themselves to the cold. They have given part of the little blood the exploiters have left them to the wounded. This is the solidarity of the poor (which has also come from Cuba, Chile, and other countries).
But let us not forget the nurses, the soldiers, and all those who although part of the state apparatus have expressed their love of the people by driving themselves, forcing themselves to do without sleep. We must not lump them together with the comfortable, greedy, and hypocritical bureaucracy. The bureaucrats and dedicated public workers are opposite poles within the same institutions, the exploiters and the exploited, like the peasants and the gamonales [landgrabbing local strongmen), like the workers and the bosses.
The popular mobilization in the face of this tragedy is quite a serious thing. A clear demonstration of this was the people's spontaneous, immediate, and indignant rejection of the irresponsible notion of celebrating a football victory in the streets at a time of popular sorrow. The alienation systematically produced by "public opinion" makers was not able to deaden the sensitivity of our people. The solidarity of the workers is a positive factor in their struggle against natural catastrophes and against the exploiters, an indispensable factor for the revolution.
For this reason, although we reject the opportunist position of "now we are one," which belongs in fact to class collaborationism, we do not fall into the sectarianism of refusing to participate in and promote this authentic popular mobilization on the pretext that that would be "playing the diversionists' game," or that it would be "philanthropy." We are participating in the mobilization and giving impetus to it with our own class position.
It is a lie that "an earthquake pays no attention to class distinctions." The adobe houses of the poor have been leveled. The cement houses of the rich are still standing. But the more harmful effects for the poor do not come at the time of earthquakes, but later. Immediately the prices of food, clothing, blankets, material for making tents, and medicine soar to exorbitant heights.
Only the rich can get these things. The poor are condemned to die of hunger, cold, and of wounds left untreated. The greater part of the deaths occur after earthquakes, although the official statistics do not list these as results of the disaster.
In cases like the Cuzco or Ancash earthquakes, which occurred in midwinter more than 3,000 meters above sea level, the freezing weather killed many people who had to sleep out in the open or with little shelter, especially children, old people, and the sick. In such instances, cold kills more easily than at other times because the people are hungrier than usual, without any calories to warm them.
The rich suffer an abrupt loss of luxuries, opulence, comforts. The poor suffer a sudden decrease in their chances of survival.
The authorities and the newspapers talk in outraged tones about "human vultures." This is the way they describe the looters and they tell us that orders have been given to shoot such people. Who are these looters? At first they are generally habitual petty thieves who take advantage of the confusion in such situations.
But as the days go on, it is the poor, who literally are without a mouthful to eat and want to keep alive, who are the looters. Instead of bread, they get a bullet. Thus the bourgeois character of the state is revealed in striking form. One of the first steps taken by the government is "sending in forces of law and order," establishing a "curfew," etc. This is to make sure that the poor die of hunger in an orderly and law-abiding way.
The real vultures are the functionaries entrusted with collecting and distributing aid. Every victim of anearthquake or similar disaster can remember being taken advantage of by these vultures.
In Cuzco we students who were working as voluntary investigators were organized by the bureaucrats. At first the victims looked to us with affection and hope. But little by little we became hated and they were almost ready to stone us, because the bureaucrats sent brigade after brigade to investigate, to study how many victims there were and what they needed, but they did not distribute the aid. It is true that part of the aid was distributed (later! when many had already died for lack of it), but only a part of the aid that came from the rest of the country and from abroad.
This aid was widely publicized on the radio and in the papers; we even saw a lot of it arrive at the prefecture. But we didn't see any of it come out. (A very widespread saying was that the only tower (torre] that benefited from the earthquake was Torreblanca, the prefect.)
We also know that the aid sent at the time of the drought in Cuzco was so scandalously plundered that the authorities had to open up an investigation. However, when the judge (Dr. Valer) ordered the appearance of two ex-ministers implicated in the emimmediately rebezzlement, he was placed. (A few years later he was arrested as an "extremist" and sent to in the heart of the jungle, El Sepa, where he died shortly afterward as a result of conditions there.)
Ranrahirca protested for years because its celebrated aid never arrived.
In none of these tragedies has there been any lack of bureaucratic vultures, vultures who caused the deaths of so many of our brothers. No order has been given to shoot these vultures.
The aid which manages to reach the disaster zone is not distributed in accordance with the economic and social status of the victims. This does not mean that more is given to the poor, but to the contrary, that the poorest are given little or nothing. "Influential persons" get the best there is and the most. (After the earthquake in Cuzco the family of a major was housed in immense tents in the Plaza de Armas. One tent served as a "reception room." At the same time poor families didn't even have a blanket for shelter.)
What should be our immediate response to these problems? We must act on two fronts-among the aid donors and the victims.
We must struggle to make the aid from the popular sectors as organized, direct, and centralized as possible.
It is very good that the unions, the neighborhood associations, and the student federations are operating in an organized way to collect aid and to coordinate their work in the affected area. We must try to get the highschool students also to organize democratically to offer aid.
We agree that the CGTP [Confederación General de Trabajadores Peruanos - General Confederation of Peruvian Workers, the CP-led union] must organize this aid. But it must do so in a democratic way, by means of representatives elected by the ranks and under strict control by the rank and file.
Aid must also be distributed by committees sent by the workers and students themselves. The more the corrupt state bureaucracy, which was not elected by the people and is not under their control, can be dispensed with the better. There must be organization, coordination, and planning, but this should be done democratically by the popular organizations.
We must promote the organization of the victims into committees or associations to watch over their immediate and future interests. That is, the victims must not only participate as directly as possible in supervising the distribution of immediate aid but watch over all aspects concerning the future of the community — reconstruction, care of orphans, etc.
The societies of people from the same province, district, and locality residing in Lima have an important role to play in giving impetus to this work. As for the Ancash Department club, however, we all know that it is a nest of gamonales and the like.
Immediate aid is essential but this will not solve the basic problem of the earthquake sufferers. We must demand more deepgoing emergency measures - immediate agrarian reform, distribution of the land to the peasants without any payment; nationalization of the industrial centers of the area under workers control; channeling profits into rebuilding the region, also under workers control.
(It is an outrage for this government, which claims that it is "revolutionary" and is making the utmost exertions to aid the victims, to try to collect a single centavo from the peasants to whom it is to distribute land. It is unheard of for them to permit the labor of the suffering workers to be diverted into satisfying the greed of the capitalists.)
We must demand a special tax on the income of capitalists throughout the country (whether they are natives or foreigners) to be used for reconstruction of the affected area.
We must demand that the destroyed towns be rebuilt in safe areas. It must be taken into account that some relatively secure sites are "barred" to such construction because they are "private property." This was the case of the town of Santa María in La Convención, located between a hill and a river, where a natural disaster caused many deaths. There was a safe site directly in front of the town but it was "owned" by a gamonal. In desperation the people of Santa María asked the help of our peasant organization. And, under its protection, they occupied the area to rebuild their town.
A few months ago we saw shantytowns built in Lima along the bed of the Rimac River, which were swept away by the flood, while the bourgeoisie of San Isidro and Orrantia happily played golf on their enormous grounds or enjoyed life in the huge mansions set in the center of extensive green lawns.
We propose the transitional measures outlined above in view of the fact that we are operating within the context of a capitalist country. But we know that the final solution our people must seek in order to confront natural tragedies like this one is to organize the country on a socialist basis. A socialist Peru will marshal all the energies of the nation from top to bottom, without any need for bourgeois "philanthropy."
There will be no need for begging private owners and industrialists to "please" provide the means of transportation, the lack of which is costing many lives. The students of the Universidad Agraria will not have to beg the bourgeoisie to "please" give them the tools for opening up the roads over which the aid will travel. The people will do this in an organized way without having to say "please" to anybody. The Cuban sugar harvests show us what this power means.
In a socialist Peru there will be no "problem of mass unemployment" of the victims of natural disasters, no "orphan problem." In a socialist Peru no child will be an orphan.
June 1970.