Mexican poet putting free speech to the test

By Kevin Sullivan
The Washington Post

Sergio Witz Rodriguez calls his arrest "absurd."

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He thought nobody was solving Mexico's social and economic problems, least of all its politicians. So he worked himself into a righteous, lyrical lather and wrote a 21-line poem, saying, among other things, that he would like to use the Mexican flag as toilet paper.

The poem was published in a literary journal in 2001. That's when Witz, a father of three girls, was arrested, fingerprinted, hauled before a judge and introduced to Chapter 5, Article 191 of the federal penal code, which calls for up to four years in prison for "insulting national symbols."

"This is absurd," said Witz, 42, a college literature professor in Campeche on the Yucatán Peninsula. "I am not a threat to the state."

After more than three years of legal proceedings that Witz described as Kafkaesque, his case may soon be heard by the Mexican Supreme Court in what legal analysts called one of the most important freedom-of-expression cases in recent memory.

The Mexican Constitution guarantees free speech, as long as that speech doesn't injure someone else, provoke a crime or incite public disturbances.

But federal law dating to the 1930s makes it illegal for anyone to insult national symbols, particularly the flag and the national anthem.

Since President Vicente Fox was elected in 2000, breaking the 71-year rule of the Institutional Revolutionary Party, he has called for greater guarantees for freedom of expression and the media.

But analysts said old thinking persists. Congress recently censured an artist for her "kitsch" depictions of the Mexican flag, and a state governor recently had two men jailed for a week for shouting insults at him at a public rally.

"We have yet to understand that democracy is based on freedom of expression," said Jaime Cardenas, a specialist in constitutional law at the National Autonomous University of Mexico in Mexico City. "The courts and authorities must learn to interpret things differently, to put freedom above other considerations."

The Witz case is similar to debates over flag burning in the United States.
 
Some argue that people in a free society have a right to desecrate national symbols in protest, while others argue that attacking those symbols is a criminal act of disrespect. U.S. laws prohibiting the burning or defiling of the U.S. flag have been ruled unconstitutional by the Supreme Court.

"By spreading his negative philosophy, he's destroying our values," said Abel Santa Cruz Menchaca, 63, a former military officer who filed the original complaint against Witz. Menchaca, whose father and grandfather were generals in the Mexican army, said Witz was "attacking something that gives us identity as Mexicans."

Menchaca said Witz has overstepped his rights by insulting other Mexicans. He said it was "dangerous" to publish such a poem, likening it to a passenger on a crowded boat urging other passengers to poke holes in the hull.

"If we don't respect our laws, we are a nation of savages," Menchaca said.

Menchaca said that when he saw Witz's poem in Criterios magazine, he brought it to the attention of Carlos Justo Sierra, the local Interior Ministry chief. Sierra said he then filed a formal complaint with federal prosecutors.

Sierra, 72, pointed to a photo on his office wall of his great-grandfather, a former ambassador to Spain, and had trouble controlling his temper as he discussed Witz.

"I'm from a family that has defended Mexico for more than 150 years," said Sierra, who is also a journalist and author. "So for me, statements against the values that symbolize my country are abominable."

He added: "Personally, I think Mr. Witz is trash."

Witz said he was told the case would be dropped if he submitted a letter of apology to the court, but thinks important free-speech issues are involved.

Witz, who has written six volumes of poetry, said the controversial poem, whose title contains an expletive, was not his best work. And he said it was published by accident: He meant to send the magazine a different piece.

"It is ridiculous to try someone who wrote a few verses, when there are so many thieves, rapists and white-collar criminals who go free," Witz said.

"Freedom to say what you think is the greatest thing a writer can have. ... This is not just an aggression against me, but against freedom."