Mexico: Honor and Glory to Comrade Saúl Morales, “Chino Pelón”
We hereby share an unofficial translation of an article published by the Mural Newspaper on the 10th of June.
Periódico Mural honors your legacy every day by making this space a voice for the exploited and oppressed. We are deeply grateful for your unwavering spirit and your firm conviction that a new world is possible. Five years after your passing, we remember you with affection and admiration, comrade Saúl.
We are sharing an excerpt from the tribute written by our comrades at Sol Rojo to commemorate the fifth anniversary of his passing.
On June 10, 2021, the heart of a militant worker stopped beating. He was one of those proletarians who were remarkably capable of embracing revolutionary theory, embodying it in their daily lives, and putting it into practice.
Comrade Saúl Morales Hernández, affectionately known among SolRojista activists as “Chino Pelón,” has passed away, leaving behind a lasting legacy of his struggle for the working class and the people.
Saúl was a worker in the bottling industry and was part of the core group that founded the Inter-Union Federation at the H2O purified water bottling plant; from there, he led the fight for the right to organize freely. Together with the workers at the bottling plant, he launched a de facto strike, demanded that labor authorities recognize the union, and later, when the union leadership—of which he was a part—was fired, he led the sit-in in the city’s main square with his red-and-black flag slung over his shoulder.
Even in the face of this temporary defeat, when the employers and the State imposed the CROC’s union bosses, Saúl and a handful of determined comrades decided to file a lawsuit over unfair dismissal and continue their organizing efforts clandestinely within the factory.
Perhaps, in the words of León Chávez Terxeiro, “it was very early days and very few were drawn to organized struggle”; but comrade Chino Pelón never lost faith in the forces of the class to which he belonged in body and spirit. He lived to devote himself to his class, merging his destiny with it.
Saul continued as an activist with the Inter-Union; he showed solidarity with the struggles and strikes of education and healthcare workers, and stood in solidarity with garbage collectors and waste pickers. He supported the struggles of the Intersindical and its various unions.
When the time came to take a firm stand, Comrade Chino Pelón chose the path of breaking with revisionism and embraced Maoism firmly and consistently. “We are Chinese to the core,” he would say, letting out his infectious laugh.
He was also seen resolutely erecting barricades in Hacienda Blanca, halting the advance of the federal police on June 19, 2016. He fought back against tear gas, guided the youth, and stood up against tyranny.
“We are no longer the same as we were yesterday,” his voice thundered at the founding assembly of our democratic organization.
“We cannot allow ourselves to be the same as the vote-seekers and the negotiators,” his voice thundered at the first public event of our combative organization.
Saúl Morales Hernández, convinced of the need to promote the program of the New Democratic Revolution, threw himself wholeheartedly into the work of the Press and Propaganda Commission.
Who doesn’t remember him at the marches, in the Isthmus, in Oaxaca, in Mexico City? Marching with the Red Sun, marching with the Intersindical, marching with the CNTE, marching too with the young teacher-training students, waving the Mural Newspaper in his hand.
Our Chino Pelón, with his flag around his neck, or wrapped in it. Our combative comrade Saúl, turning the flag into a banner and a weapon of combat, beating the pigs, beating the renegades and opportunists as well.
Comrade Saúl, Comrade Chino Pelón; the SolRojista flags that you proudly raised and defended now bow in your memory. We swear to you, comrade, that we will carry them, raise them, and defend them with the same love and indestructible faith that you did.
Saul Morales Hernandez, you live on in the hearts and struggles of the working class and the people!
Honor and glory to Comrade Chino Pelón!
Long live the working class!
