Shooting at the narco: a Guerrero village resists the siege of organized crime with bullets

For four days the shots have been sounding in the Sierra de Guerrero, in the ejido of Los Guajes de Ayala.

The men of the community surround the town of El Pescado to defend themselves with their weapons from organized crime.

With the opium business exhausted, now it is the wood from those forests that the Michoacan Family is looking for, according to the inhabitants.

But first they have to displace the populations that live there.

Shots.

Meanwhile, in Chilpancingo, the capital of the State, both count votes and those who are considered winners celebrate with music, typical clothing and colorful hats from the land.

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• The child soldiers of Guerrero cry out against the narco armed and with shots in the air

Women and children are sheltering in the church and in a local clinic and send videos asking for help with the noise of the bullets in the background.

This Thursday, things are calmer, but it has been difficult for them to eat.

"We have about 50 children in the community, now there are around 30 left in the clinic," says Marisela Mujica Sánchez, the commissioner's wife, who risks her life going in and out of the clinic to the house to make food.

"The children cry, they are hungry, they do not know what is happening," he says by phone from his confinement.

Neither have the men eaten since the week began. They grabbed their weapons and went out to defend the village. This morning the noise has died down, but they don't want to lower their guard. One of the inhabitants of the ejido, which covers some 15,000 hectares, has told this newspaper that “on Tuesday, the Army and the State Police tried to help by land, but the roads were blocked with felled trees. On Wednesday, a helicopter flew over the area, but the report from its tour is that nothing was happening, that it was calm. The Administration is the worst enemy we have ”, says this man.

The statement affirms that the agents flew over the communities of El Pescado, Hacienda de Dolores, Los Ciruelos and Guajes de Ayala, in Tierra Caliente, on Wednesday and "no signs of any confrontation were visualized." They went there after seeing the videos sent to social networks by women "with nervous breakdowns."

One of those women, Mujica Sánchez, has just told this newspaper that the bullets were still heard on Wednesday evening, although now things are a bit calmer, but without the tension of the last days having gone.

"We are few and they are many and with high-caliber weapons and armored cars," he explains.

"Now they are looking for wood, drugs are no longer valid and they want to take over our lands," he continues by phone.

"We have asked for help but they don't take care of us, so some of us go out to make food while our husbands are still around town."

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Tierra Caliente could not be better baptized. The area, between the States of Mexico, Guerrero and Michoacán is on fire. Organized crime has displaced numerous populations to expand their business and those who resist cannot give up their weapons. In February, another shooting altercation left, according to ejidatarios, 14 people dead. On the opposite side. They are remote areas that need, in some cases, kilometers of walking to get there. Wild and alien to the future of the rest of the State, where politics does not arrive even in election time. From time to time they ask for help against crime, but they say they are abandoned. Lacking, in certain places, the most basic services and without access to education for fear of going out to the towns that have educational establishments. Poverty is rampant.

Guerrero has been in this situation for decades.

The State is a pioneer in these struggles, civilians arm themselves as best they can and fight with unequal force.

The dead are not always on the side of the invaders.

In some places they have organized parades with children to attract the attention of the federal government, which has not taken the defiant gesture well.

The Government has spoken out against armed children showing the defenselessness of communities in full view of the entire world.

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