Immigrants deported from the United States, activists and religious people performed the ‘Viacrucis migrant’, where they staged the Passion of Christ to make visible the migratory phenomenon on the southern border of Mexico.
The protesters protested against the policies of US President Donald Trump, for which they were deported to Tapachula (Chiapas), where they burned a piñata to express their discomfort and the uncertainty they face.
Priest Heyman Vázquez Medina, parish priest of San Andrés Apóstol in Hidalgo, said that accompanying migrants on their path is a “via crucis” of much suffering.
«On the part of the government it remains the same, there is no interest in the good treatment of migrants. When there is an opportunity to rob them, when there is an opportunity to extort them, they extort them, there is no concern from the authorities or the civilian population, unfortunately they take advantage of migrants,” he explained.
Luis Rey García Villagrán, director of the Center for Human Dignification (CDH), stated that no migrant seeks to stay in Tapachula, where there are tens of thousands of “stranded” foreigners, while denouncing the omission of the authorities in charge of caring for them.
“Today we are going to tell the Tapachultec people that no migrant wants to stay in Tapachula, they can continue to hate, but today the migrants put Comar (Mexican Refugee Aid Commission) to work, the agencies for this purpose,” he said.
Cuban Orlando Guillen Moro, who was deported from the United States, reported that he arrived in Tapachula, separated from his family due to Trump’s policies, sending him to a third country, where they consider themselves “trapped” and face adverse situations such as hatred and discrimination.
“It means going through what our Lord, Jesus Christ, went through, we are going through the same thing as migrants and we need help from God, we ask the President to put herself in our place, we have lost money, family, work and a whole life in my case 35 years and we need a light that leads us to feel like people,” he expressed.
Raul, another Cuban immigrant, insisted that he participated in this ‘migrant Way of the Cross’ so that the Mexican authorities raise awareness and can obtain papers to remain in this area of southern Mexico.
“We are going to walk and be given the possibility of staying in this country and having a job, we are really on the cross, prisoners, supposedly we are free, there is no attention of any kind,” he said.
In their journey, some Haitian immigrants who are stranded also asked to be helped with more jobs and to improve salaries that are “too low” in the Tapachula area.
