Xalapa, Veracruz - An improvised paper calendar hanging on the wall of the Public Ministry [investigative police and prosecutors] of Tierra Blanca. As a title it bears the phrase "Susana, Mario, Jose, Alfredo, Bernardo: We continue waiting for them". At one side are photos of the youths. And below, two months are checked off: January and February.
It is the calendar of the parents of the five young people who were disappeared in Tierra Blanca Birthdays and holidays are not noted. It counts the days of suffering, waiting, wonder, impunity, of no sleep, of abandoing their homes, their work and the rest of the family to look for one of their members. On Sunday, February 21, the calendar marks day 42 since the disappearance of the young people.
A few meters from the calendar, Gloria de la O Santos, mother of Bernardo Benitez de la O, speaks of the days marked in red.
"They are the 42 days that I have been missing my child, as I say, and 42 of thinking about what happened to them. Of waiting here day and night that they might arrive at any time, or someone to tell me: 'they are there', in order to go and find them."The whereabouts of the youths and the mottive for their disappearance has not been known since Januarym 11, when they were approached by a State Police patrol car. In a report issued on February 8-day 24 of their disappearance- the authorities made public that remains of two of the five missing: Bernardo Benitez Arroniz and Alfredo González Díaz had been found in the El Limon [Lime] ranch in the municipality of Tlalixcoyan [adjacent to Tierra Blanca].
The news didn't bring tranquility to the families of the disappeared. The father of Bernardo Benitez has submitted the remains to a second test to confirm the results. And the family of Alfredo Gonzalez reject that his death will be determined based on a bloodstain.
The other parents, who for six weeks have not received evidence of the whereabouts of their children, are no better. In the encampment established in front of the Public Ministry in Tierra Blanca, Dionisia Sanchez Mora, mother of Mario Arturo Orozco Sánchez, said it has been the same since January 11:
"About my son there is nothing. All the others are the same. The only progress is that the remains of Bernardo were taken to Argentina [Argentine Forensic Team, which has been involved in the investigation of the 43 Ayotzinapa youths], but my son, Joseph, and Susana are the same," she said.For Dionisia Sanchez, the 42 days marked on the calendar have been a long wait:
"There is hopelessness, anxiety, a lot of rage, impotence. The worst thing is not being able to do anything but wait."Garibo Carmen Maciel, mother of Susana Tapia Garibo, the only female and minor [age 16] among the disappeared, described the weeks marked on the calendar as "days of torture".
Bernardo Benitez Herrera, father of Bernardo Benitez Arroniz, said that what is most worrisome 42 days after the disappearance is that investigation reports begin to stagnate.
"Now eight or ten days have passed in which even the Gendarmerie itself [divison of Federal Police] have repeated the same thing: 'We continue on the case, we continue at the ranch, we continue investigating.' and we don't leave."Spanish original