A Nobel Prize in college

In the Ius Semper Loquitur auditorium – following the strictest sanitary measures – a keynote lecture was given to the student community, which will be remembered as one of the stellar moments in the recent history of our Faculty.

Born into an indigenous family from the Guatemalan Department of El Quiché, the story of Rigoberta was marked from an early age by injustices, discrimination, racism and exploitation, to which hundreds of thousands of indigenous people living in extreme poverty in the country of Guatemala are still subjected today in the 21st century.

After a long work in the vindication struggles of indigenous peoples and peasants in his native land – which cost him political persecution and exile – in 1991 he participated in the preparation of the declaration of the rights of indigenous peoples by of the United Nations.

In 1992 he was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize, in recognition of his work for social justice and ethno-cultural reconciliation based on respect for indigenous rights.

Before an audience made up of students of excellence, Rigoberta Menchu He expressed to the young students – alluding to the difficult time we are going through – that: “We must not lose sight of the fact that humanity faces wars, conflicts … and the tiredness of the people can precipitate new conflicts.”

And it is that before the pandemic -he pointed out Menchu– We already had other issues that universalized the suffering of humanity such as: social inequality, poverty, hunger, malnutrition and illiteracy. “There is a dynamic, uncertain future. This is why we have to prepare ourselves, to respond to that future ”.

The message of Rigoberta Menchu It reminds us that peace and the right that peoples have to live in it – today – can at times be seen as a utopia. And it is that violence is not a unique subject of geographies: our Mexico like the Guatemala of the doctor Menchu they have suffered firsthand its ravages in all lines of daily life.

He told them that it is up to university students to look at problems with courage, integrity and responsibility, to face them with the best weapon we can wield: knowledge.

TO Rigoberta Menchu He was pleasantly surprised to learn that in our classrooms – within the new Faculty Study Plan – agrarian law and indigenous law are studied as compulsory subjects; Cross-cutting education is privileged with a human rights and conventionality approach and that our students also have the possibility of accrediting as a second language any of the 68 indigenous languages ​​recognized by the National Institute of Indigenous Languages.

For young people who trust the law as a factor for change and transformation of society, receive the presence of Rigoberta Menchu It has been a breath of hope. It is because her person is a living testimony of a woman who has suffered firsthand the harshness of war, but who has never stopped believing and fighting for peace.

What Corollary the phrase of Rigoberta Menchu: “Peace is the daughter of coexistence, education, dialogue.”