Teacher Mario Vallejo García, from the Isthmus of Tehuantepec, was a member of the Honor and Justice Commission of the National Union of Education Workers (SNTE) in that region. Mario taught at Technical High School number 50, located in the town of Juchitán de Zaragoza. His presence in the capital of Oaxaca, according to the union, was to investigate which teachers left the union movement during the implementation of contentious reforms to the education system. This was his role in the Commission, to which he was appointed during the fourth Political Congress of Section 22.

Mario’s body was found on the afternoon of Monday, 15 January, in a hotel room in the city centre; investigative agents have been unable to clarify the case. Two days before Mario’s murder, another teacher from the Isthmus, Fernando Ruiz Hernández, disappeared. After the disappearance, the union reported that over the years it has received reports of at least a dozen disappeared teachers and 35 murdered ones.

“Mario Vallejo was a committed colleague and his death will not remain in impunity,” said the members of the Commission of Honor and Justice. Within days, teachers in Juchitán had organised a march to demand justice by way of an impartial investigation.

Adapted from original reports by El Universal and NVI Noticias