We
looked at a map of the Mayangna Sauni As territory. As means one, and there are four Mayangna
Sauni territories. The alligators and
iguana are out now and used for food by the indigenous but we don’t sell them. There are areas specified for eco-tourism,
but that has not yet been developed.
There are areas where people are panning for gold in the BOSAWAS, but
not mines.
We’re
one of seven territories in the BOSAWAS.
We have had community titles since 2006 covering 100,632 Mz with a 197
km border and 18 communities, mostly along the Rios Waspu, Pis Pis, Wahu, and
Kaka. Forty percent of this land is
outside the BOSAWAS nucleus, in the buffer zone. The rest is in the BOSAWAS. Different areas have been designated for
artisan mining (small scale), conservation, frequent hunting, infrequent
hunting, agriculture, development, forestry, and sustainable development.
He
pointed to the map and showed the land use in 2006 vs the planned land use.
We
border both Mayangna and Moskito areas.
In
2007, Hurricane Felix hit this area and wiped out a huge area of forest and
killed all of the animals. Our boundary
markers also came down. After that was
the great invasion. Within the framework
of conservation of BOSAWAS, we proposed to place Mayangna families in the area
to facilitate renewal of the affected land, and that’s why it’s designated as a
development zone. After Felix, we can
use this area for development and put other economic activities there.
Norman
Devis is the presenter. The Eastern part
of Mayangna Sauni As territory includes the San Luci high hills, Rio WaWa, and
the headwaters of Rio WaWa that we crossed coming from Puerto Cabezas.
After
2007 the invasion started and in 2010 they began to enter in several places.
I’m in charge of protection. From 2011 –
12 more people came in closer. In 2013
seven leaders of the land grab were captured and two are in jail. After that, in 2014, we captured Aragon
(yesterday). Two of the leaders will be
sentenced tomorrow. Sixteen more have
been captured. The National Police and
the Army capture them. For the last two
years the Army has been effective, not so much so the National Police. Because the police chief of Bonanza is a land
invader, the police won’t help us patrol.
These things within the police and Eco-Battalion affect us. We want a new police chief, someone new. Herman Mora is the name of the police chief.
To
defend our land, we need the resources to pay lawyers.
The
colonizers have invaded the whole yellow area (on the map, it is where
Hurricane Felix hit). 40% of our land
has been invaded. We need boats, motors,
money to send people on patrol. Going
with just ten of the Army doesn’t do much.
On
Tuesday, we went 1 ¾ hours in and saw property markers where colonizers are
selling the land. We’re very
concerned. They come by mule. That whole area is being destroyed. One colonizer logged 50 Manzanas just in the
past month in the nucleus of the reserve.
More than three men were mining gold in that area.
Ten
days ago, we saw them making boundary lines to sell property. The miners, OUR people, asked in this office
what to do about this invasion.
With
MARENA, he Army, local park rangers, and the Mayor, we arranged to go in on
March 18. We saw that they made boundary
markers. They had gone in two km, and
have marked the area with names of supposed new owners. Further in, eleven families have
penetrated. We got very tired, with no
food. Finally we had lunch at 5:30 pm. We saw six Mz more had been logged. Seven minutes in from the mining area,
colonizers had made more penetration roads and trails.
We were
few, without logistical resources, we came back from there and wondered where
they came in from. We followed a trail
and found a house and family where 10 Mz had been logged and three horses and a
house. Oscar Hargon gave that land to
them, the family said, so we have a lot of competition. A representative of the Army provided
security. Information about their
threats to the environment and the BOSAWAS, which MARENA had compiled, was
provided to them. With their help, we
burned that house and explained that this is private indigenous property, 14 km
into Mayangna Sauni As territory. We
told them to take everything out of the house, load the animals, and
leave. We went on to see the other
places.
We went
one hour up the Pis Pis, 12 km in, and found the house we were looking for – a
property with 15 Mz logged. We burned
that house, too. Question – what was the
role of the army? Answer –
protection. WE burned the houses. The invaders accused the army of abusing
them, so WE must be the ones to burn the houses. We find animal skins – tapir and other
endangered animals. We took pictures and
have it on video. We need to act quickly in all of this.
We are planning an invasion ourselves of this area to take all of those
people out of there – if we don’t do it today, tomorrow is too late.
Question
– where do the evicted people go? Rosita
or Bonanza to be prosecuted – if they are found closer to Rosita, it is less
likely that they will be prosecuted.
They enter from all around us.
The biggest
problem is east of Rio Naspuk. They day
before we went up there, eleven families went into the north part of that
zone. We need radios to communicate with
each other. We do have cell signals in
our mining areas. We want resources –
for guns, fast boats, a headquarters, and GPS.
We want to get these invaders off
of the land and block the roads and trails they have built, and burn down the
houses. We have a budget. Always when we have visitors, we ask for
help. None has come yet.
Charley
introduced AfGJ and the Abanaki and talked about the similarity of issues,
presented a letter from the Abanaki chief.
Adoncio
Lopez is the secretary of the Mayangna Sauni As and showed a powerpoint
presentation.
Norman
worked with Nature Conservancy until 1999 and GTZ from Germany, teaching them
his experience with and knowledge of the BOSAWAS Reserve. I am a volunteer for
Mayangna Sauni As territory – I don’t get a salary.
The Pis
Pis River goes north towards Bonanza and the Waspuk goes toward the border and
Rio Coco. We want to establish that area
for a biological control station, for government institutions in the Territory
of Mayangna Sauni As. Here is a picture – we went over that hill and there was
no place to even rest. We want a
structure there with solar power, potable water, and a communications center
for talking with the Eco-Battalion in Bonanza and the BOSAWAS communities, and
to the border with Honduras. From there
we could protect a large area where colonizers are coming in. Please help us find funds.
He
showed slides of Rio PisPis, a dugout canoe they used, and an iguana; There’s a place about 12 hours upriver where
there is a house used for eco-tourism – it needs to be rebuilt – the place is
downriver on the PisPis and upriver on the Waspuk.
We
landed at the junction of the two rivers.
People are digging a small gold mine on hills named France and
Japan. They are communicating with the
Eco-Battalion in Bonanza. This is the
observation area we want to establish.
From
here you can see the boundary lines that the invaders dug very recently. We followed one – they mark on the trees with
machetes. One of the miners came to be a
witness. MARENA came. We went to where the colonizers were. They shot twice at us. We found markers in paint, “A” and “P”. We couldn’t follow all of the trails. We started at 6 am and by 2 pm we had found
lots of families (11) that we didn’t know were there, all Mestizos. We followed the road and kept following until
4 pm – there were so many trails in many directions – we didn’t know which ones
they had taken.
We
found 6 ha recently logged on two tall hills.
We circled around to try to capture them but they had left. We went further and saw a lot more
deforestation.
If we
don’t get in there NOW, they will chop down these huge tropical rainforest
trees. They have built structures and
planted beans. On our journey, we ate
rice and caught fish, using leaves for plates.
As we
were returning, we found this horse and a house with a lady inside. She went to her sons at the river. Last year an indigenous miner, Ileas Charlie
was killed with a .22 rifle where the house was. At that time, they were just cutting down
trees and planted cattle grass – they used the skins of several tapirs to make
ropes. (Picture of a woman and three
children of the house) The husband was
supposedly gone.
I
ordered her to take all of her things from the house and we burned the house in
front of the family. The army was
witness – that we told them to take their belongings back to where they came
from, even your saddle and horses. We
said that we would treat them humanely.
We
found wild foul to eat and miners gave us plantains. Now we’re back at the river.
We
manage our agricultural zones and don’t clear much land. We plant bananas and plantains to protect the
land from erosion.
Yesterday
at 7 am we took off for another place in the mountains, to investigate a
logging complaint from the community to the police. Without gas money to take the army and motor
boat, we did two missions. We went into
the mountains with the guy and his son who filed the complaint. We found a trail to an area where 50 Mz had
been logged with a chainsaw – they had planted tobacco and corn, and had a
house. By 10 am we burned the house and
the crops.
They
don’t even use the logs – they just burn them.
They divide the cleared land for different families or sell it off –
that’s their business plan, to ready the land for a cattle ranch, and they get
more money if it’s cleared.
These
are the first operations of 2014. We
hope to clear them out in 2014.
On
February 1, the operation was to capture Tomas Lopez Lopez and his son, Walter
Lopez Parillo. They planted beans,
bananas and corn along a tributary of the Pis Pis River. Together with our legal advisor (a Mestizo
from Bonanza), another police chief (not the corrupt one from Bonanza) and I
captured him. A year ago this was virgin
forest. He had a 40 ft x 40 ft house and
another small house. He took down big
trees with a chain saw and then just burned the logs. Maybe he got some boards from some logs. We found a chain saw and brought it out. He had cut ?Nancytong? wood.
Mr.
Polaz from MORENA and a technical advisor are helping (?)
The
house of the Indigenous Territorial Government was occupied by colonizers and a
domestic turkey. The GTI / BICO sign is
ours – but it was the invaders’ place of operations. The colonizers even left their hammock
behind. This particular trip was not
into the nucleus of the BOSAWAS.
This
week is the first time we actually burned houses. In the past we just knocked them down.
We
found a 3rd house, very new.
We burned it too, and turned it over to Mother Earth.
All
those who come here know that this land belongs to Mayangna, but they are land
grabbers. Three years ago we told these
people that this is Mayangna Sauni As territory, and we have the title. They knowingly sell it anyway. While we fight te legal routes, we must also
be in the territory.
We
found two horses and several of these land traffickers are cattle thieves and drug
traffickers, too. They organize groups
of armed men to steal cattle. We do our
work with great care because we don’t have a means of self defense.
One guy
“bought” 100 Mz for only 18,000 Cd. From
the land sale money, he buys lawyers to defend himself, so we must also pay
lawyers to defend our rights. We see the
big land grabber only ½ hour outside of our territory. He came from La Cruste Rio Grande in the RAAS
to invade us. We found a receipt that he
paid taxes on the chain saw, which we will use as evidence against him. We are looking for the guy who has grey hair,
to bring him in to face charges. We had
captured him but the jail said they couldn’t keep him until a formal complaint
was filed, which we have now done.
We need
radios, T-shirts, caps, etc. to form consciousness in Nicaragua on this
issue. We want to show you the film.
Alonzio
– our President is in the BOSAWAS giving talks about defending Mother Earth
because this task is so immense. The
advance of the agricultural frontier is constant. Norman coordinates conservation and defense
of Mayangna Sauni As and acts with the Eco-Battalion, Police, army, and the
Territorial Government. It’s a great
demand every day, every month.
They
are organizing groups to come and invade our territory. Last year the National Government issued a
decree to remove the colonizers. There’s
an institutional commission, a prosecutor general, the army, police, and
departments of Agriculture and Forestry, and the Territorial Government.
Some
organizations and foreign journalists have gone in and interviewed elders
regarding the problems in the BOSAWAS and done presentations like this,
especially to seek funding.
This
visit you make is important because you can get our message out and funding for
our park headquarters and ranger out there.
Thanks
to Charley and his 30-year struggle and the letter of solidarity. We hope we can work together in the future to
preserve BOSAWAS. We work night and day
to save our resources. This is part of
the green lung of the earth. For 500
years our ancestors have been fighting to preserve our resources. Thank Ortega.
All 23
territories have land problems.
Question
regarding health and education. Even on
a national level, health care is a problem, but it is worse here. Many women die in childbirth, an indicator
that our health care is bad. Even in
Bonanza we can’t get medicine. Given
transportation problems, it is hard to get care. There are a lot of deaths in our
territory. I did a study. Less than 5% of us are more than 60 years
old! And now there are even fewer than
when I did the study. Some women come to
Bonanza to have children in the hospital – but they are sterilized without
their permission, especially if they have a Cesarean birth. Jazelle said that they can be sued for
that. We would like to have doctors in
Musawas who specialize in caring for women and children. We would like for them not to have to come
into the city for medical care, because of costs of transportation, food, and
housing for the family in that situation.
Now we
must worry about our children because the mining companies are moving in. There are 16 concessions on our borders.
We are
supposed to get some money from UNESDO and carbon producing countries to
preserve this territory. However, we
don’t know how these funds are being used.
The government gives a concession and gets some money down. We want them to give concessions only with
our informed consent.
Decree
15 from 2013 on Mother Earth is a success of the struggle of the Mayangna people. We made a lot of effort to get the word out
to media, which got government attention.
After that, the Eco-Battalion really began to function. There is still a lot to be done with a
minimum Eco-Battalion to preserve the BOSAWAS.
We
believe the leader watching the BOSAWAS communication should be a
Mayangna. We are the ones who feel the
impact of the destruction. Culturally,
the forest is life (for us).
Thank
you for your visit and listening.
Alonzio
gave Kathy an email address.
End
note – On May 6 a girl died of leukemia.
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