“Zapata lives in every community that defends its territory”
In the heart of Morelos, where the land keeps memory, Claudia Sheinbaum drew a direct line between the revolutionary past and her government. In front of the monument to Emiliano Zapata, he declared that his struggle is not a historical reliquary, but rather a current mandate.
“Zapata is in the heart of the people of Mexico. Today after so many years of his assassination, his legacy lives on. He lives in every community that defends its territory in the face of adversity,” stated the president.
His speech was an act of political vindication. He connected agrarian ideals with current actions: more than 60 thousand hectares delivered in seven years and, this day in Morelos, 3,644 titles and certificates for original owners.
Women at the center of the new Zapatismo
But there was a fundamental turn. Sheinbaum put the focus where official history sometimes omitted it: on women.
“Zapatismo was also built with women,” he stressed when delivering certificates to female owners and recognizing presidents of ejido commissariats.
It wasn’t just symbology. She inaugurated the Zapatista Women’s Museum, a gesture that seeks to rewrite the narrative from the base. Martha Janeth Pizaña Castillo, ejido president, confirmed it: “gender equality has arrived in the Morelos countryside”.
The real theatrical coup came with Plan B.
Sheinbaum did not limit herself to the floral tribute. He linked the fight to the “privileges of the old regime” with concrete reforms. She celebrated the approval of the so-called Plan B, which attacks what she calls “corruption structures”: eliminates re-election, nepotism, golden pensions and cuts salaries of senior officials.
For her, honoring Zapata in the 21st century has two faces: returning the land and demolishing privileges. Governor Margarita González Saravia summarized the sentiment: “the Fourth Transformation recovers the principles that the General defended”.
In the end, between certificates and reforms, the message was clear. It is not just about remembering the Caudillo of the South, but about presenting oneself as his direct political heir. Each agrarian title and each cutback to a privilege are, in this story, symbolic bullets fired in the same war.
