A new bill before Congress is meant to vindicate Indian rights by reforming
                  seven articles of the constitution, but critics fear the proposed new law would
                  give too much power to local Indian governments.

                  Promoters of Indian rights law, born out of the Zapatista rebellion which claims
                  that the globalization of the world economy threatens Indians, say it will finally
                  enshrine rights and respect for 10 million Mexicans who are Indian, or one tenth
                  of the nation.

                  But there are concerns are that such a law would endanger the environment by
                  giving Indian groups total control over natural resources on their lands; allow
                  Indian communities to legally discriminate against women under traditions
                  known as "uses and customs"; and undermine Mexico's ideal of mixed blood.

                  Mexicans claim pride in mestizaje, the mingling of European conquerors and
                  Indians. But many -- even dark-skinned Mexicans with Indian features -- openly
                  look down on people who speak Spanish with the accent of an Indian tongue.

                  A long-stalled bill

                  The bill was drafted during peace talks between the government and the
                  Zapatista National Liberation Army, which took up arms to fight for Indian rights
                  in 1994. The peace talks fell apart in 1996 and the bill gathered dust for years.

                  Then President Vicente Fox, the first Mexican leader to come from outside
                  the long-ruling Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI) in 71 years, took office
                  in December.

                  Acting on campaign promises to end the low-level conflict with the Zapatistas in
                  southern Mexico, and holding out an olive branch to the rebels, Fox sent the
                  bill to Congress, where his National Action Party (PAN) must gather support
                  from the PRI and the leftist Party of the Democratic Revolution (PRD).

                  The reforms in the bill must be approved by two-thirds of the 128-seat Senate
                  and then by the 500-member lower house.

                  On March 28, in an unprecedented Congressional appearance by a rebel group,
                  Zapatista leaders wearing masks and traditional Indian clothes, lobbied for the
                  bill.

                  The proposed constitutional reforms would give Indian peoples the right to free
                  determination and autonomy, and the right to resolve their own internal conflicts
                  without violating human rights and the dignity of women.

                  If passed, the law would also allow Indian villages to elect their own authorities
                  and to collectively use natural resources on their lands.

                  It also would make the government responsible for improving Indian education
                  and providing interpreters and public defenders when they are in the justice
                  system.

                  Too much autonomy

                  Some experts say the proposed law is dangerous.

                  "It's one thing to recognize the autonomy that Indian people have a right to, and
                  to respect their uses and customs, their languages. But it's another thing to convert
                  these Indian communities into small independent states. That would be the destruction
                  of the country," said Ignacio Burgoa, a law professor at Mexico's National Autonomous
                  University and an expert on constitutional issues.

                  But Alcides Vadillo, an indigenous rights expert with the United Nations human rights
                  office in Guatemala, says that giving Indian communities autonomy is not incompatible
                  with a nation's central government.

                  The real problem with such laws, he said, is  that they are seldom properly implemented.

                  Mexican political analyst Lorenzo Meyer argues that Mexico's constitution
                  already guarantees Indian rights, and the law just needs to be enforced.

                  "The bulk of what the law wants already exists. There won't be anything really
                  new," Meyer said.

                  He says Indian communities have always been allowed to impose their "uses and
                  customs," without problems. For example, the obligation to do communal work
                  without pay has always gone unpunished, although it's not strictly legal, he
                  pointed out.

                  Uses and customs

                  "Uses and customs," differ among Mexico's Indian communities. But in many
                  villages traditional councils of elders, usually men, make decisions for the whole
                  community. Sometimes the councils decide how the whole town will vote in
                  state and national elections.

                  Some critics have said that because of that, the Indian rights law could threaten
                  democracy in Mexico and discriminate against women.

                  The Zapatista's Commander Esther tried to lay to rest the fear that Indian women
                  would be harmed by the proposed new law, when she spoke before Congress in
                  March.

                  She said that current laws had marginalized and humiliated women and pointed
                  out that the Indian rights law actually contains language to protect women.

                  "We, in addition to being women, are indigenous, and, as such, we are not
                  recognized. We know which are good and which are bad uses and customs. The
                  bad ones are hitting and beating a woman, buying and selling, marrying by force
                  against her will, not being allowed to participate in assembly, not being able to
                  leave the house," she told Congress

                  Meyer said the reforms as currently worded would actually force Indian
                  communities to modernize.

                  "Discrimination against women will not be allowed, they won't be able to do that
                  any more," he said.

                  Who is Indian?

                  Lawmakers said another drawback of the Indian rights bill was that it would
                  force the government to identify "authentic" Indian communities.

                  The lawmakers also worry that if Indian communities are free to exploit national
                  resources they will destroy the environment.

                  But Environment Minister Victor Lichtinger said that more control will mean
                  more protection.

                  "I am convinced that giving greater autonomy to Indian peoples in their own
                  lands, will be favorable for the conservation of those ecosystems," Lichtinger
                  said.

                  Whatever happens to the law in Mexico, rights expert Vadillo said the results will
                  reverberate throughout the region, where Indian rights are being debated within
                  the context of greater democracy in Ecuador, Peru, Colombia and Guatemala.

                  "What happens in Mexico will have an enormous political influence on the rest of
                  Latin America," Vadillo said.

                     Copyright 2001 Reuters.