Argentinian grassroots leader Milagro Sala receiving the leaders of the caravan organized to raise awareness about the ninth year of her controversial imprisonment. Photo: Sandra Castasso/Pagina 12.
There is strong support for Milagro Sala on the ninth anniversary of her arrest, the result of fierce judicial persecution. A mobilization demanded her complete freedom and condemned her status as a political prisoner. Sala, the leader of the Tupac Amaru organization, stressed that “the country was set back 50 years” and that she feels “bad for not being able to go out and fight.”
“Come in, comrades, come into the backyard,” Milagro Sala greets the people, who formed a caravan nine years after her arbitrary arrest, like someone who welcomes guests. Under the shade of a grapevine on the patio of the house in La Plata, where she is serving house arrest, the leader of Tupac Amaru is anxiously waiting for them. The house is filling up: the participants of the meeting parade down the hallway, which is an accompaniment that also seems like a celebration, a collective embrace. As she walks down the entrance hallway, a guitarist strums “Entra a mi hogar” by the Manseros Santiagueños, and for a moment, the patio becomes a club. “Continue coming in, comrades. We’ll take our photos later,” says Milagro, who is waiting for them with a rubber neck brace and is supported by a cane.
Yesterday marked another year since Milagro Sala was arrested for camping in the main square of Jujuy, in front of the Government House, to condemn the measures of the radical then-Governor Gerardo Morales. That was the first case, to which over a dozen were later added and for which she remains imprisoned today, despite the numerous complaints of procedural irregularities not only from her lawyers but also from international organizations such as the Inter-American Court of Human Rights. “If they tell me that I will regain my freedom tomorrow, of course, I would be happy, but I would also be very sad. Because I no longer have my husband or my son, I no longer have many of my companions. My life would not be the same. I continue to mourn the departure of my son and my husband,” she tells Página/12. “Hebe [De Bonafini] is not here, nor are so many companions. Can you imagine if I go out on the street? My country is no longer the same because they made it go back 50 years,” she adds.
The caravan
The caravan to demand her release and condemn that she is a political prisoner began at the House of the Mothers of Plaza de Mayo, very close to the Argentinian National Congress. From there, a group of activists from social, political, union, and human rights organizations went to La Plata to meet with the backbones of Tupac Amaru and the Milagro Sala Front, who gathered in Plaza Moreno in front of the Cathedral. They first passed by the government to thank Axel Kicillof for his support for Milagro since she was transferred from Jujuy to Buenos Aires for medical treatment. With 34 degrees [celsius] of temperature (and many more in thermal sensation) and without a cloud to attenuate the merciless rays of the sun, the mobilization arrives at the house in the Villa Elvira neighborhood with umbrellas, drums, and the organization’s white flags that carry the images of its historical referents: Tupac Amaru, Che Guevara, and Evita.
Graciela Calizaya walks on the hot asphalt. She arrived a day ago from Jujuy with thirty other Tupac Amaru companions. An organization had offered them a club to stay in, but they preferred to camp in Milagro Sala’s backyard under the fig trees. There are so many people in the house that sometimes the water runs out, and they have to wait until the tank is full again. “Today in Jujuy, being a Tupac member is being persecuted. You can’t wear a Tupac t-shirt because they’re already persecuted. They’re already filing charges against you. They took everything from us, all the things we built: the swimming pools, the houses, the sports centers, everything to destroy it. Now, there is abandonment in those places. They didn’t even use them to have the children swim there in summer,” she says.
The resistance
As she speaks to this newspaper, Milagro Sala stretches her left leg out on a chair. She has a thrombosis, and the inflammation causes her pain. Next to her, “Gastoncito,” a boy of about 10 years old, is feeding her tereré. “He is my grandson at heart, 100 percent Tupaquero,” she says. She reviews her life in prison and the persecution that Gerardo Morales and Mauricio Macri started against her, which still continues. “It is very sad because they continued to fill me with cases. My husband was in the last days of his life, and they carried out a raid on me where they filmed him and showed him everywhere. There was, and there is, a very large and visceral persecution against my family and my colleagues. I thought they would stop, but they continue,” she adds.
Before the caravan arrives, Milagro Sala is anxious, giving orders, laughing, and hugging her colleagues. “Move these chairs forward so everyone can come in,” she says, looking at a person covering up the mural by artist Isaac Vargas, which will soon be unveiled in front of all the guests. “When have you seen a black woman give orders to a gringo?” she asks and laughs. She walks back and forth through the courtyard, observing the layout of an improvised stage made of wooden pallets, walking cautiously and saying: “Lame, lame, but let her come.” Then she becomes brave and sincere: “I have to resist as a leader, but that doesn’t mean I don’t feel pain. Sometimes I feel angry, helpless, for not being able to go out and defend my colleagues,” she explains.
She talks about the damage that Javier Milei’s government is doing to the country. She says that “what we are experiencing today is not a democracy because there is no freedom of expression.” She also talks about the leadership that should oppose it but that “is paralyzed.” “Unfortunately, there are many leaders who, I don’t know if it’s out of fear or what, but today they are not going out into the streets, and those who go out, go to a certain place and turn back. Today, Argentinians do not need leaders to take them for a walk or to go around the merry-go-round. Before, the electricity price would spike, and we would be out on the streets. Today, not being able to do anything makes me feel bad. It makes me feel bad not being able to go out and fight,” she says.
The accompaniment
“Being with Milagro today is extremely important because she is also part of our frustrations,” says former Secretary of Human Rights Horacio Pietragalla to Página/12. “She had already served three-quarters of her sentence. She should have been on parole, but it is not being carried out because it was always a political issue, not a judicial one. There is clear persecution by the real powers of Jujuy because Morales is no longer in the government, and, nevertheless, Milagro continues to suffer persecution and harassment by the concentrated powers of the province,” he explains.
Juan Vitta, a member of the National Roundtable and the CTA Neighborhood Front, who arrived with the caravan of cars that came down the highway with signs and wiphalas, also talks about why Milagro Sala remains in prison after three different governments: “There were changes of government, but those economic powers are permanent. Lawfare in Latin America is a tool of the powerful to discipline and apply corrective measures to those who dare to challenge them. Milagro Sala represents the possibility of law and resistance to all these powers—the eventual ones, like Milei or Morales, or the permanent ones, like the owners of everything in Argentina. And we are going to turn that around,” he explains.
The general secretary of the Permanent Assembly for Human Rights (APDH), María Elena Naddeo, agrees: “The objective of economic and political power is to silence her voice and that of Tupac based on their [the power’s] business: extractivism, the lithium and mineral business, and expensive lands. They seek to discipline and silence those who rise up in defense of their territories, in defense of their rights,” she adds. In addition, she refers to the responsibility of Alberto Fernández’s government in maintaining this situation: “It is unforgivable that the previous democratic government did not free her, and it is unforgivable that the political, popular forces have not been able to achieve her freedom.”
The deacon of priests in Opción por los Pobres, Ricardo Carrizo, also speaks of this responsibility. “We always told her that we were going to get her out, and we tried in every way, with back and forth, but it was not achieved. The one who had the power of the pen to be able to resolve it was more afraid of the headlines than of facing reality. The lawyers for crimes against humanity had presented him with all the legal reasons to be able to do so at the level of national and international legislation, and yet, hiding behind the excuse of not wanting to break the Constitution, he was simply afraid,” he says.
The symbol
“We miss you in Jujuy,” a reporter tells her and hugs her while crying. Milagro Sala also cries and extends the hug. They let go, and Milagro puts her arms around her again. In that meeting there is admiration and affection but also nostalgia. There is uncertainty and hope.
“Milagro is a symbol of struggle, of the meeting of generations and of the importance of what an organized community means,” says Carrizo. For Naddeo, “she represents a woman persecuted for being a woman, for being poor, and for coming from indigenous sectors. She represents the most brutal oppression, which is the oppression of a misogynistic patriarchy and a patriarchal political power.”
“Milagro represents us all. She is dignity, struggle, work, and education. That is what she taught us, and that is why we came from Jujuy today to embrace her,” Graciela Calizaya sums up.
(Pagina 12) by Celeste del Blanco
Translation: Orinoco Tribune
OT/JRE/SF
