Defending Rio Blanco: Three Weeks of the Lenca Community Roadblock (Honduras)
Defending Rio Blanco: Three Weeks of the Lenca Community Roadblock
It is now evening and dark at the patch of earth where Rio Blanco community members have gathered to defend their territory from companies that seek to privatize and profit from the Gualcarque river. Children talk and giggle as they as they tell jokes in the dark at the edge of the woods where they will soon fall asleep. The adults, however, are alert and vigilant for whatever might occur, given the threats they are facing. Many gather around the open fire where the coffee is boiling. A group of them will stay awake all night to watch over the camp that prevents access to the Agua Zarca Hydroelectric Project, where private companies have started construction to build a dam.
The Indigenous Lenca community of Rio Blanco is isolated and hard to reach. Few vehicles travel the winding dirt roads to arrive here and horses are the preferred mode of transportation within the community. Community members survive by growing corn, beans, bananas of all sizes, yucca, coffee, and other crops. They have lived on this land for generations and wisely steward it; certain sections are designated for growing food while a large area of forest is carefully protected to preserve their water sources. By preventing deforestation they do indeed have water to use for living, drinking, and growing food. Now, however, companies want to restrict their access to the Gualcarque River by privatizing it with a dam to generate profit for wealthy, powerful Honduras and foreign investors.
The powerful interests behind the Agua Zarca Project include the Honduran Bank FICOHSA, whose president is Camilo Atala, an extremely powerful businessman identified as one of the “intellectual authors and financers of the (2009 SOA-graduate led) coup d’etat.” Just months after the coup, the Honduran National Congress passed a General Water Law enabling the country’s water resources to be concessioned to third parties. At the same time, FICOHSA paid Lanny Davis, former special counsel to President Clinton, to lobby Washington on behalf of the repressive, post-coup regime led by the former president of the Congress. The project has international investors from several countries and a Chinese state company, SINOHYDRO, has been contracted to work on the project. To round it out, the World Bank and Central American Bank for Economic Integration are involved.
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However, the project continued to move forward. Construction began, destroying community members’ crops that they depend on to eat. The community of Rio Blanco had had enough. On April 1, 2013, they began to block the dirt entrance to the Agua Zarca project to demand its withdrawal from their territory. They subsequently gave the company 72 hours to leave, which it failed to do. Instead, community members have received death threats and there is constant surveillance of the community and members of COPINH. They have also faced harassment and have noticed hitmen arriving in the region. On April 12th at 6:30am, they were evicted by police patrols, including riot police, who dumped out their drinking water and removed their banners, sleeping pads, and supplies. They couldn’t remove the people, however, who were on their own land after all, and their presence continued.
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http://www.soaw.org/about-us/equipo-sur/263-stories-from-honduras/4096-rioblanco2#_edn1
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