{"id":18453,"date":"2019-06-30T17:37:19","date_gmt":"2019-07-01T00:37:19","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/elenemigocomun.net\/?p=18453"},"modified":"2019-06-30T17:38:12","modified_gmt":"2019-07-01T00:38:12","slug":"on-the-coast-of-oaxaca-afro-and-indigenous-tribes-fight-for-water-autonomy","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/elenemigocomun.net\/2019\/06\/on-the-coast-of-oaxaca-afro-and-indigenous-tribes-fight-for-water-autonomy\/","title":{"rendered":"On the Coast of Oaxaca, Afro and Indigenous Tribes Fight for Water Autonomy"},"content":{"rendered":"

By Samantha Demby<\/strong><\/p>\n

At dawn on March 14\u2014celebrated internationally as the Day of Action against Dams and in Defense of Rivers\u2014Afro-Mexican, Indigenous, and mestizo peoples met on the shores of the R\u00edo Verde to participate in a ritual of gratitude and resistance.<\/p>\n

They were gathered for the R\u00edo Verde Festival, organized each March by the Consejo de Pueblos Unidos en Defensa del R\u00edo Verde (Council of Peoples United in Defense of the R\u00edo Verde, COPUDEVER). This water protector movement was formed in 2007 when dozens of communities organized to stop the Federal Electricity Commission from building a hydroelectric dam on their river, which they say would flood their homes and contaminate their only source of water.<\/p>\n

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The R\u00edo Verde\u2014known as St\u00e4itya Tan\u00e1<\/em> in Chatino and Yutya Cuy<\/em> in Mixtec\u2014is the main source of life for dozens of farming and fishing towns in the Southern Sierra and Pacific Coast of Oaxaca. \u201cThe R\u00edo Verde is part of us; or rather, we\u2019re part of that nature, of all that surrounds us,\u201d says Eva Castellanos, a COPUDEVER member from the community of Paso de la Reyna. \u201cIf the river didn\u2019t exist, Paso de la Reyna definitely would not exist.\u201d<\/p>\n

After 12 years of marches, blockades, and assemblies, not a single rock has been laid for the foundation of the megaproject. Today, COPUDEVER is confronting a new challenge: to transform its successful opposition of the dam into a multi-generational movement in defense of the river.<\/p>\n

For towns like Paso de la Reyna this has meant rewriting local laws to ban extractive projects and exert more control over the land and water. Residents are also redefining their identity as Indigenous water protectors by restoring ancestral traditions and creating new ones. One key to this metamorphosis has been the R\u00edo Verde Festival, an autonomous holiday that brings communities and allies together to give thanks for their natural commons.<\/p>\n

El R\u00edo Verde: Collective Social Property<\/strong><\/h3>\n

T<\/span>he smell of conga\u2014<\/em>a freshwater crab found in the deep parts of the R\u00edo Verde\u2014is enough to rouse the overheated travelers who have come for the R\u00edo Verde festival from their late-afternoon daze. They take seats in the communal kitchen of Paso de la Reyna, where women in floral dresses tend to the fire and listen to tropical cumbia. Over the loudspeaker, a voice asks neighbors to donate tortillas for the event. A committee of men swiftly replaces each empty plate with a fresh pile of gleaming, juicy conga.<\/p>\n

Paso\u2019s high level of collective organization is a legacy of not only the community\u2019s sustained resistance movement but also its Indigenous, agrarian roots. Paso was founded as an ejido\u2014<\/em>a form of communal property\u2014<\/em>for Chatino farmers during the 20th<\/sup>-century land reforms that followed the Mexican Revolution. While in recent decades the Mexican government\u2014pushed by international institutions like the World Bank\u2014has privatized much of this land, the area surrounding the Paso de la Reina Hydroelectric Project has resisted this tendency. It\u2019s still 95% percent communal property<\/a>.<\/p>\n

This territory also supplies water for a large segment of Oaxaca\u2019s population. The Verde-Atoyac River Basin<\/a>, where the hydroelectric project would be located, covers 20% of the state\u2019s surface area, home to over a third of its residents. The basin maintains nearly 15% of Oaxaca\u2019s existing mangrove area. The R\u00edo Verde is considered one of Mexico\u2019s 51 most important rivers<\/a>, through which 87% of the country’s surface water runoff flows, according to a report from the University of Campeche and the Institute of Ecology, Fisheries and Oceanography of the Gulf of Mexico. In the case of the R\u00edo Verde, its runoff plays an essential role in replenishing the Pacific watershed.<\/p>\n

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Yet elders from Paso say the river is today just a shadow of its former self. Manuel S\u00e1nchez\u2014a 75-year old Pase\u00f1o <\/em>whose Chatino grandparents were among the first settlers in the community\u2014recalls a riverbed filled with diverse flora and fauna, each of which played a vital role in the ecosystem.<\/p>\n

Back in those days, Pase\u00f1os<\/em> were always prepared when the river flooded, he explains. That\u2019s because the coastal \u201cchameleon\u201d toad issued a timely warning: \u201cThose little animals started to scream and scream and scream!\u201d recalls S\u00e1nchez; \u201cThat signaled the river was going to overflow\u2026 You didn\u2019t sleep, helping your neighbor so that he wouldn\u2019t lose anything. And nothing was lost.\u201d<\/p>\n

But in recent decades, deforestation and drought have led to the toad\u2019s extinction: \u201cIt\u2019s been years since I\u2019ve seen those animals,\u201d says S\u00e1nchez, who adds that crustaceans and fish have also vanished due to changes in the riverbed. S\u00e1nchez recalls that when he was a child, his father would go fishing at night with a dozen neighbors. By sunrise, they would return with enough shrimp and diverse species of fish to feed each family for the entire week. But this came to an end in 1992, when Mexico\u2019s Water Commission built the Ricardo Flores M\u00e1gon dam downriver, which residents say has impeded the natural migration of many species. \u201cNow all we have left is shrimp and mojarra,\u201d says S\u00e1nchez.<\/p>\n

The memory of this loss helped to spur a broad resistance movement that began in 2006, when affected communities discovered plans for the new dam from the local newspaper. Jaime Jim\u00e9nez Ruiz, a COPUDEVER member and law enforcement officer from Paso de la Reyna, says that not only were residents not properly informed about the project, they were also never consulted as required by Convention 169 of the International Labor Organization, of which Mexico is a signatory.<\/p>\n

The Council of Peoples United in Defense of the R\u00edo Verde<\/strong><\/h3>\n

Struggles to prevent the damming of rivers are also social movements against disappearance. <\/span>In Mexico, from 1936 to 2006, the construction of\u00a0over 4,000<\/a> dams led to the displacement of approximately 185,000 people from their communities. Human rights organizations say that in the past 10 years alone, the construction of dams in the country has been associated with the detention of over 250 people and the assassination of at least <\/a>eight <\/a>water protectors<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The anti-dam movement is also a struggle against the disappearance of a whole ecosystem, made up of myriad forms of life that depend on a river\u2019s flow of nutrients and sediment. According to a report from International Rivers, large-scale dams can harm their environments<\/a> by blocking fish migration, changing the river\u2019s temperature and chemical composition, trapping sediments that are necessary for downstream habitats, and causing the buildup of contaminants. \u201cEven subtle changes in the quantity and timing of water flows impact aquatic and riparian life,\u201d the report states. This can \u201cunravel the ecological web of a river system.\u201d<\/p>\n

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On the coast of Oaxaca, the nonprofit organization Servicios para una Educaci\u00f3n Alternativa (Services for an Alternative Education, EDUCA, where I am currently employed) has calculated that the Paso de la Reina Hydroelectric Project would directly affect 17,000 people and over 7,400 acres of land, and cost $1.1 billion USD. The project would consist of two dams\u2014one upriver of Paso measuring 147 meters, and a second, 20-meter dam located downriver from the town. \u201cPractically, we were going to end up like the ham in the middle of the sandwich,\u201d says Jim\u00e9nez Ruiz, the COPUDEVER member.<\/p>\n

In 2009, when Electricity Commission workers entered the proposed dam site escorted by state police, community members agreed it was time to act. \u201cWith the little experience we had, we decided to establish a blockade,\u201d says Jim\u00e9nez Ruiz. For eight years, the men and women of Paso maintained a 24-hour security encampment at the entrance to the community, impeding the access of workers, machinery and security forces associated with the hydroelectric project. While community members decided to scale down the blockade in 2017, they maintain active security at all of town\u2019s entrances and exits.<\/p>\n

For COPUDEVER, the blockade was just one part of a multi-pronged strategy to prevent the megaproject. Members have worked with religious and civil society groups in the region to mobilize neighboring communities and organize mass marches. Beyond Oaxaca, COPUDEVER\u2019s participation in the Movimiento Mexicano de Afectados por las Presas y en Defensa de los R\u00edos (Mexican Movement of Peoples Affected by Dams and in Defense of Rivers, MAPDER), and the Red Latinoamericana contra Represas y por los R\u00edos (Latin American Network against Dams, REDLAR), has enabled water protectors to coordinate strategies and actions with communities across the continent.<\/p>\n

Since 2016, several COPUDEVER communities have shifted their focus to strengthening community control of natural resources. In the local laws passed by Paso de la Reyna last year, residents not only managed to prohibit large-scale extractive and energy projects like hydroelectric dams, metallic mines and pipelines, they also approved regulations to remedy the over-exploitation of the R\u00edo Verde\u2019s resources.<\/p>\n

The goal was \u201cto find a proposal for managing our communal lands and natural resources equitably,\u201d explains Jim\u00e9nez Ruiz<\/span>, the law enforcement officer who also played a key role in writing the new ordinance. In practice, this has meant banning the sale of the river\u2019s resources outside of their community, as well as placing limits on their own consumption of conga, fish, iguana, deer, and wild boar, depending on these animals\u2019 breeding seasons and the health of their populations.<\/p>\n

To accomplish this, it was important to get everyone on board\u2014including proponents of the dam who had stopped engaging in community life for nearly a decade. \u201cThere was a deterioration in our town, the town was torn to pieces,\u201d explains Jim\u00e9nez Ruiz. For eight years, one sector of the community stopped participating in collective work (known as tequio<\/em> in Spanish), and also opted out of the town\u2019s \u201ccargo<\/em>\u201d (charge) system, through which residents are assigned political, administrative, and security tasks in the local government. \u201cIt was necessary for these people who withdrew to return,\u201d says Jim\u00e9nez Ruiz. In the end, this is precisely what happened. \u201cRight now Paso\u2019s vision is different than it was last year.\u201d<\/p>\n

Festivity and Autonomy<\/strong><\/h3>\n

T<\/span>he struggle of recent years has not only strengthened the community\u2019s control over natural resources, but is has also helped to revitalize their culture as native water protectors. \u201cAfter so much exhaustion and running all over the place, fighting with governments, we also need to recognize this and join together in celebration,\u201d reflects Jimen\u00e9z Ruiz. \u201cJust as sometimes there is pain, there is also joy.\u201d<\/p>\n

The community celebration, fundamental to cultural identity, not only brings residents together to celebrate what is sacred; it also requires collaboration in numerous tasks, from the preparation of food to the decoration of devotional altars. In turn, the celebration revitalizes collective commitment through conviviality and ritual. \u201cIt\u2019s an articulating axis of collective work,\u201d explains Astrid Paola Chavelas, a postdoctoral student in Rural Development and member of the Red de Defensoras y Defensores Comunitarios de los Pueblos de Oaxaca (Network of Community Defenders of Oaxaca, REDECOM).<\/p>\n

The men and women of Paso don\u2019t think twice about staying up all night to celebrate their river, then driving to a remote village to speak about their water protector movement, then traveling back all night\u2014all while standing in the back of an open-air pickup truck. Festivity is part of Pase\u00f1o resilience.<\/p>\n

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Spirituality is also a key facet of the festivity. Indeed, long before the dancing started, community members inaugurated the celebration on the shores of the R\u00edo Verde at dawn through rituals of gratitude rooted in Chatino, Maya, Mixe, and Mixtec cultures. They followed these traditional rituals with new practices like the floral ceremony, in which Pase\u00f1os spread flowers along the riverbed to honor its natural abundance as well as express the community\u2019s aspiration to restore it.<\/p>\n

The communities\u2019 spiritual connection with water is also apparent in quotidian practices like fishing, farming, and cooking, which have been passed down from generation to generation. These were on display throughout the humid afternoon: to bait the blanquilla<\/em> fish, a handful of corn dough is placed inside an overturned clay vessel. To prepare stone soup, a river stone is heated on the fire until it is red hot, then dropped into a pot of shrimp until it boils. And to transform native maize into a feast, the possibilities are abundant: coconut tostadas, empanadas, a corn flour drink called atole<\/em>, and sweet squash and bean tamales.<\/p>\n

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Many of these cultural practices are tied to the communities\u2019 Indigenous identity, which they have readopted in recent years. In fact, last year was the first time that Paso\u2019s laws identified the community as native Chatino. \u201cWe described ourselves as an Indigenous people because our ancestors were Indigenous,\u201d said Jim\u00e9nez Ruiz, and because \u201cwe still preserve many ancestral customs in the town.\u201d This includes the production of a wide variety of native corn for self-consumption, such as \u201colotillo<\/em>, tehuacanero<\/em>, rabbit corn, and black corn.\u201d<\/p>\n

In the past, Pase\u00f1os did not identify as Indigenous due to the loss of their native language as a result of migration and a discriminatory state education system. But residents\u2019 reevaluation of what it means to be Indigenous\u2014along with an analysis of their cultural and political orientation\u2014has led them to embrace this identity.<\/p>\n

Community members are trying to build on this tradition by taking steps toward food sovereignty, starting with the prohibition of genetically modified corn and a commitment to pass native varieties of maize onto their children and grandchildren. In the end, Pase\u00f1os\u2019<\/em> goal is for future generations to enjoy the full abundance of the R\u00edo Verde. \u00a0\u201cWe have to give life to our land and to our people, to ensure our children’s well-being,\u201d said Pedro Gonz\u00e1lez Robles, President of Paso de la Reyna\u2019s autonomous security council, as the festival drew to a close. \u201cBecause if we falter, the government is going to enter, plunder and destroy… But by uniting we become stronger\u2014unity is the greatest force for achieving our aims.\u201d<\/p>\n

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Check out the song, \u201cCuidemos el medio ambiente,\u201d<\/a> written by a member of the resistance movement’s Afro-Mexican communities and performed during the R\u00edo Verde Festival this year.<\/span><\/i><\/strong><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

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