Chapter 23

Jorge Guerrillero and Maria Velazquez were swept up in the exuberance and the exhilaration that overwhelmed the crowd.

"The revolution has begun!" shouted a man who was standing nearby.

The crowd responded, "Long live the Revolution! Down with the government! Down with corruption! Power to the Poor!"

Jorge, who had organized the demonstration, found himself being hoisted upon the shoulders of several of his supporters.

"Long live Jorge Guerrillero, our leader!"

A loud roar accompanied that. Jorge was overwhelmed by the emotion and the acclamation of the crowd. A bullhorn was handed to the new revolutionary leader.

"Long live the Revolution!" shouted Jorge into the bullhorn. The crowd roared with glee. "Power to the Poor!" Another loud cheer. "No more hunger in Mexico! No more corruption! Long live the Revolution!" Each time there was a deafening roar of approval from the masses assembled in the Zoccolo.

Jorge began to issue orders.

"We must take control of the police stations, military installations, airports, radio and television stations. We must do this peacefully if possible, by force if necessary."

With those instructions, the demonstrators who had just brought down the government set out to begin consolidating power for their Revolution.

In Merida, capital city of the Yucatan, news of the deaths of the senior members of the government and the massive demonstrations in Mexico City spread like the flash floods that sometimes plagued that tropical city. The reasons for these demonstrations, the protest over the acquittal of Finance Minister Pedro Cohecho, one of the most powerful landowners in Merida, also filtered through the city, a bit slowly at first, but gradually building momentum as the day progressed.

By late afternoon, the revolutionaries in Mexico City had taken over one of the major television stations and were issuing a call to their previously shut out countrymen and women to take action against the rich and powerful who had kept them poor, hungry and powerless. The reaction was almost immediate as the police station and the Governor's mansion were hit with Molotov cocktails and the prisoners were freed. A mob of several thousand formed and began marching through the wealthy section of the city with Cohecho's mansion as their ultimate objective. As they proceeded, many mansions along the way were stormed and overrun, with the mobs confiscating all weapons and other items of value that they could find. Wherever there was resistance, those who resisted were killed, and their mansions, their prides and joys, were sacked and then burned.

The dark pall of smoke that preceded the throng as it passed through the neighborhood hung over the inhabitants and their palatial homes. Several of the mansions were guarded by the maids and other servants who defended their employers by explaining to the leaders of the delegation through the rich niche that their employers had treated them well and had treated them fairly; these places, for the most part, had been spared.

The armed, angry mob finally reached Cohecho's mansion, where they encountered several armed guards standing behind locked gates that were the only break in the twelve foot high, barbed wire-topped wall that surrounded the spacious grounds.

"We want the thieving dog Cohecho, who steals food from our hungry babies in order to enrich himself!"

"He and his family left this morning for Miami," came the reply from within the compound. "The only people here are the servants."

"We want to see for ourselves. Open the gate."

"I am afraid I cannot do that, Señor. Señor Cohecho left instructions that we were not to admit anyone who is not a member of the family or staff."

"Señor, look behind us," said one of the spokesmen for the mob, pointing to the ominous orange glow evident above the trees. That is what is left of the homes of those who resisted us. There are thousands of us here. Many of us have rifles and other weapons. We will enter the mansion of the thief, whether you admit us or not."

A menacing silence enveloped the crowd while they awaited the guards' answer. The stillness was broken about three minutes later by the steadily increasing volume from a loud engine that appeared to be approaching their position from several miles away. A hopeful look appeared on the guards' faces as the roar of the engine neared and as the source of the noise became evident as it came around a bend in the road a half mile before the gate.

The mob began to give way and to begin moving toward the cover of a nearby copse of trees as the tank approached. Several of the leaders of the mob remained near the gate, although they were careful to move out of the direct path of the tank.

The tank, covered with uniformed Mexican soldiers, slowed as it approached the gate, finally halting about twenty feet in front of it. The soldiers jumped off of the tank as a lieutenant stood in the hatch.

"We are here to arrest Pedro Cohecho in the name of the revolutionary government! Open the gate and admit us, or else we will blow up the gate, the wall and the mansion."

A loud cheer erupted from the crowd which came running from the woods to swarm around the tank.

A voice came from behind the captain of the guards.

"Admit them and let them see for themselves that Señor Cohecho and his family have indeed left. I don't want any bloodshed here," said the head of the household staff.

The gate was opened and the guards were quickly disarmed by the throng who rushed toward the mansion. They swept throughout the main residence, taking everything of value that could be carried. After that, they methodically checked all of the other buildings on the estate, as well as the surrounding woods and grounds. Pedro Cohecho had indeed fled. The lieutenant radioed this information to Mexico City, which confirmed that Cohecho had flown out of Merida that morning, bound for Miami, then New York.

Meanwhile, in the most populous city in the world, sporadic gunfire and occasional explosions could be heard as scattered battles took place between defenders of the old regime and the vanguard of the new. The revolutionaries had taken over most of the radio and television stations in the city by dusk, and mutinous soldiers had control of the armories; therefore the revolutionaries controlled much of the communications network and the heavy weaponry of the old government. No flights had departed from any of the airports in the country since 2:00 that afternoon, when Jorge Guerrillero had ordered that the borders be sealed and all airports closed to prevent corrupt officials from escaping justice.

Reports were starting to come in from various parts of the country, and for the most part, they were encouraging for the revolutionaries. The revolutionaries were in control throughout the southern part of the nation, as well as in Chihuahua, which a few weeks earlier had been the scene of violent confrontations between government troops and rioters, following allegations of fraud in the gubernatorial elections, which of course had been won by the P.R.I. candidate.

Word of riots and summary executions of corrupt government officials and wealthy landowners began to filter into the capital.

Jorge Guerrillero had chosen to address the citizens of Mexico for the first time as head of the provisional revolutionary government from the ancient Aztec ruins of Teotihuacán. He had chosen this site because it was a symbol of the Mexican peoples' ties to the land which went back centuries before the arrival of the Europeans.

His followers began ferrying tens of thousands of people to the ruins of Teotihuacán, commandeering every one of the loud, poorly maintained buses and trucks that could be found in running condition and pressing them into service on behalf of the revolution. These old trucks and buses once more belched noxious pollutants into the foul smelling, acrid and often toxic air.

Standing in the shadows at one end of the huge courtyard that was ringed by Aztec ruins that were still in the process of being reconstructed following their destruction by the Conquistadors, Jorge looked out at the thousands of men, women and children who were holding candles high in the air, patiently waiting to hear their new leader speak. Technicians checked the sound and light systems that had been set up and looked toward the mobile television vans that had been brought in to broadcast the speech to the nation. Signaling that all was ready, they turned the spotlight on the podium that had been set up and behind which Maria Velazquez now stood.

Recognized by the insanely joyous crowd, many of whom she had devoted her efforts to help in every way possible over the past several years, Maria was forced to wait ten minutes until the cries of "Santa Maria" quieted enough to allow her to begin.

"¡Poder a la gente!" (Power to the People!) Sustained cheering that lasted another five minutes. "Down with the corruption that steals food out of the mouths of our babies!" More cheering.

"We will build a new Mexico, one that takes care of the poorest of the poor so that he or she will no longer suffer the cruelty, pain and suffering of starvation, of being forced to live in a cardboard shack, of being forced to drink water that has been polluted by raw sewage, or being forced to search through garbage heaps for food!" Still more cheering.

"And now, I would like to introduce the man who will lead us into a new age, a new age where the poorest person is the equal of the richest, and where there will no longer be any want for food, clothing, housing, education or medical care, Jorge Guer - rill - er - ooo!!!"