Viva Mexico?

Viva Mexico?

“Patriot: the person who can holler the loudest without knowing what he is hollering about.”

Mark Twain

By: Erreh Svaia

When I was a teenager, like a lot of teenagers I hated my country, the 70 years rule of the so called "perfect dictatorship" if the PRI did a lot to lower everyone's expectations, corruption, repression and politics murder, there wasn't much to say about our country, even crisis exploded as a result of the so called "Mexican Miracle" announced when Carlos Salinas became president, but then came the "Error of Diciembre" and reality reached us again, the PRI was busted out of presidency, but Vicente's Fix right wing populism was not the answer everyone expected, the night before the elections that Fox won in 2000, I realized that I didn't hated my country, I loved Mexico and its people so much, but I truly loathed the government, the politicians and everything around them.

September 15-16 are the days the country celebrates its independence, but as ever years, more and more people realize that there is nothing to celebrate, we still have a corrupt and inept government, after 12 years of "change", the PRI returned and we are close to the abyss once again, another Mexican Miracle, this time called the Mexican Moment, again vanished in the air, and countries we thought behind us like Panama, Costa Rica and Guatemala are giving us big lessons in government, institutions and civility.

Today we face more and more volatility coming from the outside markets, with China deceleration, with Europe deflating, and is a moment where the country should be strong enough to resist the turbulent waters in which we now sail, seven years after the big economic crisis of the 2008 hit us, the world is still hurt and there are no concrete signs of a better situation as we expect the FE in the U.S. to maintain its interest rates in order to stop creating more devastating waves.

I love Mexico, and I would love the country to reach its full potential, at the time and in the region we should be leading looking forward to create powerful economic blocks with Brazil, Chile, Colombia and the US in order to take the continent out of its lethargy and start creating economic growth, because of our geographical position we are destined to play an strategic role in the integration and development of America as a whole entity, but unfortunately we have too many issues to solve, a see politics crisis, the weakness of our institutions, the fight against organized crime, politics corruption and the people disbelief on the government, the country is in a moral crisis, in a personality crisis and in a maturity crisis, this is the moment to wake up, to re-invent ourselves and to understand that we need change, that we can't keep the slow pace anymore, we need change and we need it fast, but a change that starts from within ourselves as society, not a violent change, not a stupid "Mexican Spring" but the evolution of us as a forward thinking society, one that must be feared by its government and not vice versa, a society that question its government and one that demands better health, education and labor conditions, one that demands the chance to grow, and one who is not easily bought with bread and circus.

I love my country but I want it to reach its full potential, I want a free society who take responsibility for the young, the poor and the sick, a society who demands more high quality education and less football, one who demands more high quality hospitals and less soap operas, a society that wakes up and enters maturity and finally realize that neither heroes or "caudillos" are the answers, but responsibility and courage, we have to start to love ourselves and to demand more of ourselves, in order to demand the government for better actions, for better conditions.

We need actions, intelligent, strong and disciplined actions in order to really set the country in motion, not to derail it like the radicals wish it to be, we need to get together, not to be divided, because divided we will fall.

Nothing to celebrate but HOPE.