In the northern state Baja California, as throughout the country, the deficit of popular housing is one of the problems that displays, at the highest level, the huge social inequality that ranks Mexico among the most unequal and unjust nations in the world. And it is equally notable, hereby, the collusion between the political class and the big construction enterprises: first, the government pays no mind to the poors´ complaints of worthy housing, or, at best, they are demanded to supply requirements impossible to achieve, in order to discourage and throw them into the sharks called construction industries; in second place, the government gives the building companies every chance to hoard susceptible lands of urbanization so they can build up, overnight, as grown up from the ground, whole cities with thousands of houses and apartments of “social interest”, I mean, real crowded honeycombs, jails that are offered to people with “reasonable payments” that make them be in debt for a life time.

All of this and more is what explains the conflict, that has already almost become everlasting, between the Baja California “antorchistas” particularly the ones living in the important border city of Tijuana, and the municipal and state governments before which, for obvious reasons, they have to present their needs and demands. I´m interested on focusing in a particular conflict that, due to its length and repeated mentions through the media, is already domain of the national public opinion. I mean, of course, the Alamar stream case. The thing is that, since many years ago, even before the “antorchismo” arrived to Baja California and long before a contingent of precarious took the issue in their hands, over a thousand families as stated by the state government, raised their humble houses in an area that, actually, is part of a dry riverbed of an ancient water flow known with the name previously said, circumstance that makes it a risk zone for their inhabitants.

The curious part is that, during several years, nobody said anything about it and there wasn´t a serious concern for the risk these people went through. And suddenly, not knowing how or why, the municipal and state government became obsessed in saving them from a probable flood, and they began to push the families, with the argument that “it is for their own sake”, so they vacate the territory and seek for a safer place to live. And this was the point of beginning of  the conflict that has lasted until today. I confess, honestly, that I ignore what really happened before this issue fell into the hands of the “antorchismo”; but I certainly do know that, due to it , there has never been such a resounding and irrational denial from the over a thousand families in risk to accept the replacement. The obstacle has been, and is, the denial from the two levels of government to offer the people a real replacement alternative, this is, a land that really overcomes the risks and discomforts of Aldamar and a sufficient economic help to cover the relocation and construction expenses of their new housing. One must remember, in deed, that we are talking about people with low and scarce incomes.

This is the bone of contention. The municipal and state governments, looking forward to impose their conditions to the precarious, have tried just about everything. One day, they promise the needed help, the day after, they declare that there aren´t lands, and the few ones available are too expensive, that the relocation expenses are too high and the government “has no economic resources”, etc. This has happened to the point of drawing up detailed bills on which their signatures have been sealed as government representatives; and then it turns out that such bills and the respective rubrics are less than wet paper: anything that was agreed is accomplished, they deny shamelessly to have signed such agreements and end up threatening, secret or openly, the precarious and their leaders.

What is it all about? What´s behind all of this? Anything from another world; anything that we , “antorchistas”, haven´t already lived in other plains. People know it and say that the Baja California government has a special interest in kicking them out from Alamar because, to the benefit of some big enterprises, including many assembly plants, they want to urbanize the zone with big steps and build up in it important roads that supply fluid communication between the goods and the respective producers. This is not a problem for the “antorchismo”; it doesn´t see such project as something wicked or prejudicial for Tijuana inhabitants; but it does see wrong, and really wrong, that the government wants to do it at the poors´ expenses established in Alamar; and even worse, that they lie to the public opinion about the real purposes and that the affected ones are accused of being against the relocation, to oblige them to give up to their elemental rights.

It is true that the pressure over the urban land in Tijuana is one of the biggest in the country, because of the high migration looking forward to cross to The United States of America. It is also true that any government has extra money to squander it to the first one who asks for it. But it is even more truthful that Alamar inhabitants have antiquity rights over the disputed land; and something even clearer, they do have rights of owning a worthy housing as any other Mexican. Therefore, the Baja California government has no other choice but to respect those rights and relocate these persons in legal terms and social justice. The government has to leave immediately its intimidating campaign, of collusion threats, prison to leaders and dirty defamations to discredit and reduce them to the blind obedience. The national “antorchismo” backs up its Baja California brothers completely, and will show that support as soon as their circumstances require it.