by Su Docekal and José Luis Avila,
co-founders of the Libertad para Nestora/Freedom for Nestora Committee
After Nestora Salgado’s hard-won release, the Freedom for Nestora Committee met in Seattle, Washington in June 2016 to wind up our campaign. We reviewed and approved a financial summary of our work, and finalized the delivery of donations to the nine remaining community police political prisoners in Guerrero, for whom we held a benefit after Nestora’s release. At the June meeting, the committee voted to change its name to the Freedom for Political Prisoners Committee—In Defense of Human and Labor Rights in Mexico. The committee also decided to suspend meetings over the summer and come together again in the fall to decide future plans. We retained $209 in our treasury for possible future projects.
Unfortunately, we neglected at the time to change the name of our committee on this website and to take down the donate button we used during the campaign. This oversight has led to serious charges of wrongdoing by Da Nie Luna, a Nestora supporter who created the Facebook page Comité de Mujeres #NestoraLibre. Last week we were contacted by a number of people alerting us to the fact that Da Nie Luna was using Facebook to launch an international campaign accusing us of “fraud” and alleging that “the money they (the committee) collect never gets to Nestora Salgado nor her family.”
The committee wants to assure the many people who supported and endorsed the campaign to free Nestora Salgado that these charges are unfounded and completely false. The committee’s website has not received any donations through PayPal since March 2016 with the exception of one person whose donation was refunded.
For those who would like to review the final committee finance report, covering our activities from November 2013-June 2016, we invite you to do so here.
It is extremely destructive to any movement when unfounded charges are circulated and we wonder about Da Nie Luna’s motives for this attack. She failed to let the committee know there was a problem before slandering us far and wide and has since gone on to malign the Freedom Socialist Party, Partido Obrero Socialista and other groups that worked to free Nestora from the very beginning of the struggle.
Despite this latest bump in the road, we remain proud of the committee’s accomplishments in initiating the international campaign to free Nestora Salgado and all political prisoners, and in our meticulous and transparent handling of all funds that were donated towards that cause. We consider it a duty to treat workers’ money with the utmost respect because we know how hard it is to come by.
Freedom for Political Prisoners Committee 