The Secretariat of National Defense (Sedena) collected personal information from environmental leaders who opposed energy projects that sought to use the 'fracking' technique in the Huasteca of San Luis Potosí.
From 2018 and, at least, until 2021, the institution followed the trail of the actions of opponents and even issued orders to its elements to infiltrate the activities.
In August 2018, through sheets, the Sedena Internal Order Analysis Group (GAOI) identified political and community groups; kinship; mobilization capacity and the events in which each of those involved in the social struggle participated.
The files of the social leaders were sent from an email identified as “complaints” and with the domain of the Sedena to another with a generic domain identified as “solo12_34@hotmail.com”, Causa Natura confirmed through the files leaked by the hacker-activist group called “Guacamaya Leaks”.
The threat of extracting hydrocarbons through the fracking technique began in 2013, after the approval of the Energy Reform promoted by Enrique Peña Nieto, said Rogel del Rosal Valladares, a member of the National Anti-Fracking Alliance and one of the monitored activists.
“When the State's willingness to dispose of land from indigenous communities and small landowners became clearer, it was when the Five-Year Plan for the exploration and extraction of hydrocarbons was published in 2015,” said Del Rosal Valladares.
According to the National Alliance Against Fracking, this technique starts with drilling a vertical well until reaching the formation that contains gas or oil.
Then, a series of horizontal perforations are made, which can extend for several kilometers in different directions. Through these horizontal wells, the rock is fractured with the injection of a mixture of water, sand and chemicals at high pressure that forces the flow and exit of hydrocarbons from the pores. A single well requires between 9 and 29 million liters discharged.
“But this flow decreases very soon, so it is necessary to drill new wells to maintain the production of the reservoirs. For this reason, hydraulic fracturing involves the occupation of vast areas of territory,” they say.
Among the associated problems are the decrease in the availability of water; contamination of aquifers; damage to human health; global warming; caused earthquakes, among others.
On August 6, 2018, the newspaper La Jornada reported that the Secretariat of National Defense (Sedena) authorized the state's production company Petrleos Mexicanos (Pemex) to use more than 190 tons of explosives for exploration in 18 municipalities in Huasteca. He also reported that the American company Shlumberger Offshore Services NV began to take steps in municipalities to obtain permits.
Following the publication, different groups intensified their struggle and mobilizations.
At the end of July 2018, a meeting had been held with 500 people to address this problem.
The leaders' cards were issued on August 18, 2018, according to the date of the Sedena email.
In addition to Rogel del Rosal Valladares, information was also traced from his wife, Rosa Esther Peña Soto, who serves as advisor to the Coordinator of Peasant and Indigenous Organizations of Huasteca Potosina.
The activities of Professor Domingo Rodríguez Martell, leader of the Indian State Peasant and Popular Parliament and, at that time, municipal president of the municipality of Tinajas, one of those affected, were also monitored.
The list is joined by Miguel Ángel Guzmán Michell, of the organization “A New Country with the People Until Victory”; Said López Olmos, of the Huasteco Democratic Movement and Víctor Ramírez Santiago, of the Peasant Front for the Struggle of Lands.
Information sheets were also made about the social organizations of which the activists are members.
But the Sedena wasn't limited to environmental leaders. Other offices leaked by Guacamaya Leaks show that officials requested information from mayors, deputies and public opinion regarding fracking.
Although with the change of federal administration in 2018, the discourse regarding the use of fracking changed, Sedena's follow-up to the hydrocarbon extraction project did not end with Enrique Peña Nieto's six-year term.
In February 2020, prior to a visit by President Andrés Manuel López Obrador to the municipality of Tancanhuitz de Santos, historical information was collected about the process of struggle and social leaders.
In addition, it was ordered to monitor the activities of the different social actors, in order to detect any event they intended to carry out surrounding the possible visit of the president.
To this end, the document states that social work would be carried out in the municipality, “in order to obtain relevant information”.
“Information search personnel will be integrated into this activity to gather more data and have a broader picture of the activities that the inhabitants intend to carry out, mainly from indigenous areas,” it was said.
The objective, they add in the command instructions, was to get closer to the population and go unnoticed.
In April 2020, profiles of social leaders were recirculated through emails from the Sedena. In August of that year, only one was sent with the profile of Rosa Esther Peña Soto.
Fracking in the presidential speech
Since October 2018, during his thank you tour, Andrés Manuel López Obrador committed himself in San Luis Potosí not to implement the extraction of hydrocarbons through the fracking technique. The message was reiterated on December 1 of the same year, during his inauguration of protest as president of Mexico.
However, according to research conducted by the National Alliance against Fracking, during 2019, six Plans for Exploration of Hydrocarbons in unconventional reservoirs were approved by the National Hydrocarbons Commission (CNH) for public and private companies, which include the drilling and fracturing of wells in the coming years.
In addition, they say, Pemex continues to place the exploration of unconventional deposits as a priority in its 2019-2023 Business Plan.
Since 2018, at least eight initiatives have been submitted to prohibit the practice of fracking, six in the Chamber of Deputies and two in the Senate, but all are pending a ruling.
Sedena, without powers to monitor
The main objective of the Sedena, according to information from the agency itself, is to organize, manage and prepare the Mexican Army and Air Force, in order to defend the integrity, independence and sovereignty of the nation; guarantee internal security and contribute to national development.
The Internal Security Act, in its article 5, empowers the intervention of the Armed Forces when it comes to acts aimed at carrying out espionage, sabotage, terrorism, rebellion, treason or genocide within the national territory; foreign interference in national affairs that may affect the Mexican State; acts that prevent the authorities from acting against organized crime; obstructing or blocking military or naval operations against organized crime; actions against aviation security; attacks against diplomatic personnel; illegal trafficking in nuclear materials, chemical, biological and conventional weapons of mass destruction; illegal acts against maritime navigation; financing of terrorist actions and organizations or acts aimed at destroying or disabling infrastructure that is strategic or indispensable for the provision of public goods or services.
The Army has no authority to monitor or monitor socio-environmental movements, unless they fall within one of the above precepts, which is not the case with the anti-fracking movements in San Luis Potosí.
The monitoring of social leaders by the Sedena, in the context of the demonstrations, did not surprise Rogel del Rosal. In an interview with CN journalism, he said that he is not afraid, but rather concerned about the use of his information.
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