According to Reports, Mexican student who was speaking an Indigenous language in a nation that is still working to eradicate racial discrimination was set on fire and severely burned in a classroom.
Juan Zamorano attended a high school in the Queretaro state in central Mexico, and two of his classmates are suspected of pouring alcohol on his seat in June. One of them set Zamorano on fire when the 14-year-old realised his pants were wet and stood up, according to his family.
He had second- and third-degree burns, and he was only recently released from the hospital. Because of his Indigenous Otomi ancestry, Juan had already endured weeks of bullying, according to the family’s attorneys, who have since filed charges against the alleged attackers and the school administration.
Juan’s native dialect is Otomi, but Ernesto Franco, one of family’s attorneys, told AFP that Juan “doesn’t like to speak it much since it’s a source of derision, abuse, and bullying.”
According to claims made by the family to the media, “Zamorano’s instructor also bullied him because of his ancestry”.
“She thinks that we’re not her class, we’re not her race, Zamorano’s father, who described the attack as attempted murder”.
State prosecutors in Queretaro have declared an inquiry into the assault, and the alleged offenders may face legal action. In case it becomes necessary, the country’s attorney general’s office may take on the issue, according to President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador.
Jesus Ramirez, a spokesman for Lopez Obrador, said that fighting racism was everyone’s job and that Juan’s “only offence was speaking Otomi.”
To stop new instances of racism and discrimination, they said that immediate action was required in schools.
More than 7.3 million individuals in Mexico, a country with a population of 126 million, considered as Indigenous, and 23.2 million people speak an Indigenous language.
image credit : fronteras desk
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