The struggle is not for power, but a call to the organization of the peoples. María de Jesús Patricia Martínez, first indigenous woman for the presidential candidacy in Mexico: María de Jesús Patricia Martínez, first indigenous woman for the presidential candidacy in Mexico

Abstract

This article addresses the arduous attempt of the National Indigenous Congress (CNI), the Zapatista Army of National Liberation (EZLN) as well as a section of civil society to consolidate the nomination of the Indigenous woman and traditional physician María de Jesús Patricia Martínez - known as Marichuy - as a presidential candidate in the 2018 elections in Mexico. We briefly describe the emergence in 1994 of the EZLN, which managed to give visibility to the struggles and demands of indigenous people, and we highlight the work carried out by indigenous Zapatista women both in the struggle for their rights, as well as in the various aspects of autonomous tasks within their communities in resistance. We conclude that through a series of irregularities, the institutions as well as electoral bureaucracy prevented the possibility of Marichuy appearing at the polls as an independent candidate.