Ixcotel Penitentiary
Oaxaca May 2, 2007

On the morning of May 1, I received an unexpected visit by an unknown person. Instead of giving me his name, he told me to call him “Tacho Canastal” and said that he had been sent by Ulises Ruiz Ortiz and Sergio Segreste Rios, who, in a supposed meeting with them the day before, had ordered him to talk to me.

The message was clear: they asked me to accept that someone from my family begin to dialogue with the government to negotiate my release. He warned me that they know someone in my family was participating in what he called the "big mess". If my family members don´t "calm down" and if they refuse to negotiate with the state, I would be transferred to the Altiplano or Almoloya Prison, the man said. He added that the government had every reason to kill me.

I know that the pragmatic thing to do in the political sense is to enter into a dialogue, to keep this visit a secret and try, to the extent that my dignity permits, to take advantage of the possibility of release and avoid being killed. But I am not a politician and to me, between pragmatism, political negotiation and treason, there isn’t too much difference.

I write this so that all who receive this message will know that if the things described above happen to me, that they know who is responsible, they have first and last names. I also want to express to the Dignified and Combative People of Oaxaca, my profound trust that the struggle and the mobilization will obtain my liberation and liberation for all the political prisoners of Oaxaca.

Today, the government made me aware that there is something worse than being incarcerated in a prison, and that is to have my family threatened.

It wasn’t enough for the government to have me imprisoned; now they want me to serve as a calming mechanism to the people’s insurgency. I don’t doubt that in order to obtain their freedom many would do so; they are the one’s who, when the people yell, “rebel!” they yell “negotiate!”

I clearly and honestly retain the conviction that my Brothers and Sisters, the people of Oaxaca, will obtain my freedom and freedom for all the political prisoners of Oaxaca. Even if it wasn´t like that and if the people of Oaxaca got frightened and gave up the fight, in this moment, I still would not be ready to enter into a dialogue or negotiate my freedom. Ricardo Flores Magon, in the face of the abandonment he suffered on the part of the unions and the people, when he became a prisoner, said that such abandonment did not give him the right to abandon or betray his ideals.

I think that being incarcerated, as a domesticating mechanism that serves the government, is worse than being a political prisoner. I wouldn’t be able to look into the eyes of the clean and honest faces of all of you, my brothers and sisters who are out there fighting for a better world.

David Venegas Reyes
Ixcotel Penitentiary
May 2, 2007