Ismael Zambada Garcia, aka “EL Mayo”, one of the most wanted drug lords in the world, was interviewed at an undisclosed location, somewhere in the Sinaloa’s hills, by the founder of the Mexican magazine, Proceso, Julio Scherer.
This is an extract of the interview, and a picture in which the face of the drug lord can be seen for the very first time since the 70’s.
Reporter – Have you ever felt the army too close to you.
Mayo Zambada – Yes, four times, but Chapo has more.
Reporter – How close?
Mayo Zambada – Up in the sky, over my head. I escaped into the bush, of which I know his branches, the rivers, the stones, everything, if I keep myself quiet for a minute, or I’m careless, they could catch me, like they once did to Chapo. In order for us to meet today, I came from far away. And as soon as we’re done, I will go away.
Reporter – Are you afraid to be captured?
Mayo Zambada – I feel panic of being behind bars.
Reporter – If you get caught, would you end up with your life?
Mayo Zambada – I don’t know if i would have the arrests (balls) to kill myself. I want to think, yes, I would kill myself.
[Reporter -I found out the Capo is careful with his words. He uses the term “arrests”, and not the classic slang. Zambada carries the bush in his body, but possesses his own confinement. His sons, his families, his grandsons, his son’s and grandson’s friends, all of them like to party. They frequently go to clubs and public places and the Capo can’t come with them. He tells me that for him, there are no birthday parties, the celebrations, and the cakes for the kids, the happiness of the quinceaneras, the music, the dancing]
Reporter – Is there any moment for tranquility in you?
Mayo Zambada – I’m always afraid
Reporter – Always?
Mayo Zambada – Always
Reporter – Will you finally get arrested?
Mayo Zambada – Any time now, or may be never.
[Reporter – Zambada is 60 years old and he got started in the drug trafficking business at 16. 44 years had passed which it gives him a great advantage on his today’s prosecutors. He knows how to hide away, he knows how to escape and he is loved among the men and women where half of him lives, and half of him dies]
[Reporter – There hasn’t appeared any traitor yet, he suddenly expresses to himself]
Reporter – How did you get started into the narco traffic business? His answer makes me smile.
Mayo Zambada – Just because.
Reporter – Just because?
Reporter – Just because? I ask again.
Mayo Zambada – Just because, (he answers again).
[Reporter – There is no way in to that conversation and I keep myself to my own ideas: The narco as an irresistible and pitiless magnet that follows the money, the power, the yachts, the airplanes, the women, own and of others with the big houses and buildings, the jewels as colorful marbles to play with, the brutal impulse that leads to the summit. In the capacity of the narcotraffic exists, terrified without any horizon. The capacity of crushing.
Zambada doesn’t ignore the prosecution the government has unleashed to capture him. That’s their right and duty. However, he despises the army’s barbaric actions. The soldiers, he says, brake doors and windows, they penetrate into the intimacy of the homes, they plant and spread terror. In this unleashed war they find immediate response to their actions. The result is the number of victims that grow. The capos are their targets, even though they are the unique figures of past times].
Reporter – And what are they? I ask.
[Reporter – Zambada responds with a fantastic example]
Mayo Zambada – Let’s say one day I decide to gave myself up to the government so they can execute me by fire squad. My case should be an example, a lesson to everybody. They execute me and euphoria explodes, but while days pass by, we would find out that nothing has changed.
Reporter – Nothing after the fall of the Capo?
Mayo Zambada – The problem with the narco, it wraps millions of people up. How to dominate them? and about the captured, dead and extradited Capos, their replacements are out there already.
[Reporter – To Zambada’s judgment, the government came to late to this war and there is nobody who can solve in days, the problems generated in years. With the government, infiltrated from the bottom up, time did it’s “job” within the heart of the system and the corruption grew it’s roots in the country. To he president, his collaborators cheat on him. They are liars and they inform him about advances that there are not true in this lost war]
Reporter – Why is it lost?
Mayo Zambada – The narco is within the society, rooted like the corruption
R– And what do you do now?
M– I work in agriculture and livestock farming, but if I can do a “business” in the united states, I do it.
Reporter – I was pretending to dig in about the capo’s fortune and I choose to use the Forbes magazine to get this topic into our conversation, I stared to his yes, faking to be anxious, “did you know that Forbes magazine includes Chapo among the biggest millionaires in the world?”
Mayo Zambada – That’s foolish.
[Reporter – I had on my lips the following question, now superfluous, but I couldn’t contain it anymore]
Reporter – Could you figure in the Forbes list?
Mayo Zambada – I already told you, that’s foolish.
R– Is very well known your friendship with El Chapo Guzman and it couldn’t bring any attention the fact that you could had been waiting for him outside of the Puente Grande prison the day he escaped. Could you tell me in which way did you lived that particular story?
M– “El Chapo” Guzmán and I are friends and compadres and we call each other on the phone frequently. But that story never existed. It’s another lie they are trying to pin on me. Like the invention about me planning a hit on the President. I would have never thought of that.
R– Zulema Hernandez, Chapo’s mistress, told me about the corruption prevailing in Puente Grande and about the way that corruption made it easier for Chapo to escape. Do you have any knowledge about what went down that day and how things were developing?
M– I know that there was no bloodshed, only one dead. I don’t know anything else.
Reporter – With an unexpected question, Zambada surprises me:
Mayo Zambada – Are you interested in Chapo?
Reporter – Yes, of course.
M– Would you like to see him?.
Reporter – I came to see you.
Mayo Zambada – Would you like to see him?.
Reporter – Of course.
Mayo Zambada – I’m going to call him, may be you could see him.
[Reporter – Our conversation comes to an end. Zambada, standing up, walks under the sun’s plenitude and again, he surprises me]
Mayo Zambada – How about a picture?
[Reporter – I felt an absolutely unexplained heat inside of me. The picture was the proof the authenticity of the encounter with the capo. Zambada called one of his bodyguards and he asked him for his hat, he put it on. It was white of fine quality]
Mayo Zambada – How do you like it?
Reporter – That hat it’s so bright, it takes the personality off of you.
Mayo Zambada – What about the cap?
Reporter – I think so.
Reporter – The bodyguard aimed with the camera, and shoots…….
Theodore Lee is the editor of Caveman Circus. He strives for self-improvement in all areas of his life, except his candy consumption, where he remains a champion gummy worm enthusiast. When not writing about mindfulness or living in integrity, you can find him hiding giant bags of sour patch kids under the bed.