PASTA DE CONCHOS: A PENDING DEBT
On February 19, 2006, mine 8, Pasta de Conchos Unit, in the state of Coahuila, Mexico, suffered an explosion due to the accumulation of methane gas, 65 workers died and only two bodies were recovered, the rest were buried. Technical specialists and authorities at the time considered that the recovery of the remains of the other miners was high risk.
One of the political and campaign banners of the current Mexican president, Andrés Manuel López Obrador, was to rescue the bodies of the miners and honor their memory through moral reparation for the damage. However, 18 years later, and a few months before the current president ends his six-year term, the tragedy of Pasta de Conchos is still valid, without substantial progress. The families continue to demand that the rescue of the remains of the 63 miners trapped after the explosion in the mine be prioritized.
However, despite the agreements assumed by President López Obrador and his solidarity with the families through the Comprehensive Plan for the Reparation and Justice of Pasta de Conchos, the relatives continue to consider that there is “non-compliance due to the lack of clear progress to achieve the rescue of the miners and regret every year not being able to give their families a dignified burial.”
Accountability
After a crisis, society and affected groups will always demand measures so that another similar tragedy is not repeated, through strategies to guarantee the safety and well-being of the population at risk and vulnerable areas. However, what happened in Pasta de Conchos has not been a reference for learning, social organizations have insisted that currently “there are no non-repetition or security measures in the coal zone of Coahuila” so that similar tragedies do not continue to occur like the one on August 3, 2022, at the El Pinabete mine, in Sabinas, Coahuila, where 10 miners were trapped.
In Mexico, in recent years, the actions of mining companies in the coal region of Coahuila have been the cause of denunciation and controversy because more than 100 deaths of people dedicated to mining have been recorded, according to the organization Familia Pasta de Conchos, which brings together relatives of the deceased.
Closing a crisis inevitably leads to accountability. All crises, and even more so those managed by the government, require a participatory and public accountability process, where all voices are heard. When it is not transparent and satisfactory for those affected, the social reproach will arise that the government fails to comply due to inability or political expediency.
Accountability makes possible a catharsis that releases tensions and stabilizes the political and social environment. It is necessary because crises bring harmful consequences to people, communities, social sectors, or the environment, and are usually the product of intentional or reckless actions, or omissions of organizations or specific people. Society and the victims demand to know who the culprits are and ask that they be punished. When there is open, public, transparent accountability and justice is done, the most affected people enter into a catharsis, a purification of emotions, a feeling of justice and vindication that their demands were met. If there is no space for this social catharsis to occur, tensions accumulate, and confrontation increases, demands for justice will continue perpetually.
After a crisis, there are always open wounds
As part of this accountability, the government carries out emotional remediation activities to produce this much-needed social catharsis to heal wounds; and of a legal nature to do justice, truth commissions are created to sanction the facts and punish the guilty, and only later, as long as the wound has healed, are monuments built that commemorate the fact or in memory of the victims and Public artistic events are held, among other actions.
In accountability, the process is often politicized, which is why strong and independent justice institutions that carry out transparent and impartial investigations are essential. There will always be interest groups that will try to hide or reserve the matter, due to the negative consequences it could represent for their political careers, public image, and even administrative and criminal legal effects.
There are many ways to avoid accountability, but the most used is to bet on oblivion, which consists of diverting attention to other issues, reducing its presence on the public agenda, and hoping that the issue wears out and loses public interest. A second strategy is to point out and punish scapegoats to cover up those truly responsible. A third is to bureaucratize the issue, through palliative actions that never get to the bottom of the problem to delay the processes, such as creating commissions, redoing the investigations, delegating the issue to another administration, and trying to resolve economic agreements with some relatives to divide the movement, etc.
Accountability is important for the development of a country and for the stability of a government, it means that authorities accept and learn from their mistakes, recognize systemic failures, and the position from which they must start to carry out the necessary corrective actions beyond political and economic interests.
A crisis can produce permanent confrontation scenarios that destabilize a government or, on the contrary, a crisis can be the opportunity to strengthen its legitimacy if it acts with honesty and social sense, putting the public interest before particular interests.
Pasta de Conchos has not been a reference for learning in the management of a mining crisis in Mexico, nor for the different governments who have not known how to respond or provide solutions to the demands of the affected groups, much less do justice. Transparency and accountability are still a critical issue for both the government and companies… There is much to do in prevention, crisis management, learning from experiences, accountability, and damage repair.
