Ready to go

CITY OF MEXICO

As the day before, on Friday, July 26, 1968, the city of Mexico returned to the calm of dawn. That day, commemoration of the badault on the Moncada barracks in Cuba, the streets of the center of the capital were preparing for a march planned for this event occurred in 1953.

Still hot for the zamarreada that the grenadiers Had given them two days ago in the citadel, students of the Polytechnic School lined up at the Ministry of the Interior to obtain permission and demonstrate against police brutality. Although he warned that with or without her, they would go down the streets. As they did

This apparent tranquility was reflected in the information published 50 years ago today in Excelsior . The most important note was the resignation of the Government of Bolivia. Also the confirmation of a meeting between the Presidents of Mexico, Gustavo Díaz Ordaz, and Lindon Johnson, United States, for September this year.

That on July 26 of 50 years he published the news of the inauguration of the Great Road hotel. The opening of this hotel had aroused such an expectation that, even before its inauguration, it had already been fully booked, so that next October it would be the seat of the presidents of international sports federations and also leaders of the International Olympic Committee (IOC). ). Avery Brundage, then IOC President, had personally visited the construction of the Camino Real, which was considered the most modern in the country, according to information published in the edition of Latest News Second Edition of Excelsior Tuesday, August 22, 1967.

The first page of this newspaper published information, where Díaz Ordaz was commissioned to launch the now legendary hotel, currently owned by Grupo Empresarial Ángeles. "The president inaugurated the Camino Real hotel," said the chef who crowned a photo of the Mexican president in front of a microphone and flanked by his wife, Guadalupe Borja and Cecilia Chauvet of Legorreta.

In preparation for the October Olympics Manuel Mejido wrote a note on the Olympic torch, which was later revealed to be aluminum; and that the Olympic stadium flame would be able to withstand winds of up to 90 kilometers per hour, which would be equivalent to a hurricane and 100 mm rainfall, compared to a flood.

In the editions of the meridian and evening of Excélsior the one appearing around noon and the other in the afternoon, was informed of preparations for two marches: one to commemorate 26 July Cuban and another to protest the police intervention in Vocational 5, to temper the rage in a student trial.

In the column Coffee signed by Fermín Palacios, in the first news, it was reported that students are preparing a protest "They plan to do it today in the streets. at the same time as making a comment should serve as notification to the public.Since we already know what protests organized by boys on the street.So they do not clash, they are at least capable of destroying shops, stealing property, harbading the public, and doing many things collectively called vandalism, "wrote Palacios. The Extra published on page 9 note entitled "With or without permission, students of Poli state that they will make their demonstration."

And it's always about two o'clock in the afternoon of this Friday 26 of 50 years, the authorities of the Ministry of In the Interior, then in charge of Luis Echeverría, who was President of Mexico City between 1970 and 1976, did not consent to the student rally.

The note then reports that since midday, hundreds of students from the National Institute of Professional and Pre-professional National Polytechnic, pending permission of the Governor to march in protest against the grenadiers, but up to one hour in the afternoon had not received an answer to

However, notes the reporter, the students said the demonstration would be made, with or without permission. As it happened a few hours later

Arturo Aparicio, Ángel Mendoza, Miguel Partida and Cecilio Cruz, the leaders of the Executive Committee of the Society of Poly students, were those who managed the permit, with the idea that There would not be a new confrontation with the grenadiers, as it had happened the previous Tuesday in the Vocational 5.

The note of The Extra mentions that in the posters and blankets that the students would take to the march that day, they asked for the firing of the grenadier leaders, with the warning that if they had not been abducted they would be doing a total stop in all technical schools.

In this context the protests scheduled were extended against Article 145 of the Penal Code, which they stressed students, is a legal shield to protect looting and savagery.

The students gathered to start walking, then asked their colleagues to avoid what happened last Tuesday. . In addition, in a wall newspaper, the polytechnic schools showed pictures of the battle with the grenadiers on Tuesday, July 23.

The students concentrated at the doors of Vocational 5, in the Plaza de la Ciudadela, at 4 o'clock in the afternoon, he made the Monument to the Revolution, then walked to the Casco de Santo Tomás, as it happened with part of the contingent, since another party was taken to Zócalo where the march arrived on July 26th.

The relationship between the Cuban government, the triumph of its revolution in 1959 and certain political, academic and intellectual sectors of Mexico was immediately reinforced. The 1960, according to the photograph published on July 26 of this year in
Excelsior shows part of a group of 36 Mexican students who then went to Havana "invited by the government of Fidel Castro to attend the celebrations of the celebration of the movement of July 26. "

In this context, it is clear that the government of the capital of the country had planned that July 26 there would be a demonstration. Above all, this relationship between Cuba and Mexico was public and well known

. The proof is that on July 25, 1968, a note entitled "Culture in the celebration of Cubans" was published in this newspaper.

before the demonstration, informed that the Mexican-Cuban Institute of Cultural Relations and the Embbady of Cuba will commemorate tomorrow the 15th anniversary of the badault of the Moncada Barracks, with a ceremony at the Cultural Center of Coyoacán

. The National Federation of Technical Students (FNET), led by its chief, José R. Cebreros, was holding an antechamber in the offices of the Secretary General of the Federal District Department, Rodolfo González Guevara – who, in 1986, was part of the critical current of the PRI, although he left this party in the mid nineties, with the idea of ​​announcing that in parallel with the commemoration of July 26 Cuban, he studied the students of the school polytechnic and also students of high school Isaac Ochoterena, as said to Excelsior Cuauhtémoc García Ortega, would participate in a march for aggression of grenadiers on the previous Tuesday.

Among Poli students, the FNET and its leaders were identified as close to the government and the known PRI infiltrated this organization after 1956. Although it is also related to Section X of National Union of Education Workers (SNTE) and do not have much confidence In fact, in April 1968, the leaders of this group met with President Gustavo Díaz Ordaz to thank him for all that He had done for them, according to the information published in Excelsior