A small rectangle room fills as students voice their feelings towards Mexico’s government and its social injustice.
Students for Quality Education at CSULB held an open dialogue Monday night in remembrance of 43 still-missing students. SQE screened Vice News documentary, “The Missing 43: Mexico’s Disappeared Students.”
The documentary followed the story of the missing 43 students who upon traveling by bus on Sept. 26, 2014, planned to protest at the Mayor of Iguala wife. Reportedly, the students were stopped and detained by the municipal police of Iguala who opened fire on the students. In total, 100 students from Raul Isidro Burgos Ayotzinapa Normal School entered the city after nightfall.
“The students who went missing were doing a political action against the mayor’s wife because they don’t agree with what they do as in the government there,” said Norberto Lopez, event organizer for SQE.
SQE is a political advocacy group for higher education on campus. The organization believes higher education should be free to all students, so that everyone can be given the right to broaden their horizons regardless of what their background is, according to CSU Students for Quality Education.
Lopez said that the students were attending school for their teaching credentials. This is not the first attack on students fighting for social justice in Mexico, according to the George Washington University National Security Archive.
“You can relate it to the Tlatelolco Massacre in 1968 where the same thing happened” Lopez said. “Students were uneasy about the government and all the money they were spending on the Olympics.”
Military personnel opened fire on the students in 1968 in La Plaza de las Tres Culturas, killing hundreds of protesters.
“Now in 2014 you have the government involved in the disappearance of the students trying to inflict fear on the people who believe in social justice,” Lopez said. “ So it matters to us because we believe in education.”
Students attending the SQE event have also followed the history of massacres in Mexico. They said that they believe social justice needs to be served and that the Mexican authorities need to give answers.
“Forty-three missing, 43 who could have been successful in life just taken out of this earth,” freshman psychology major Ana Murillo said. “There was no justice for that.”
Mexican authorities confirmed a total of six victims died during the two attacks. The next day survivors of the attacks began to search for their missing classmates in local jails and police stations, but their whereabouts were unaccounted for.
“They say they found their ashes but I feel like it can’t be real,” freshman psychology major Denise Soto said. “Parent’s don’t have their bodies there is no proof that it’s them.”
Two days after the attacks took place, Guerrero state authorities arrested a total of 22 Iguala police officers connected to the attacks.
The attacks, authorities believe, were coordinated by the Guerrero Unidos cartel and the mayor’s wife, according to the Vice News website.
“It’s important for students to be informed about what’s going on in the world,” Associated Students Incorporated Cultural Diversity Secretary Brenda Vasquez said. “And be well aware of the injustice that is going on.”
La Raza will have a “die-in” vigil Tuesday night for the 43 missing students on the Free Speech lawn at 6 p.m.