Saturday 23 August
2008, San José, Costa Rica
PERU:
Indigenous Groups Win
Major Battle in Congress
By Milagros Salazar
LIMA (IPS) - The
Peruvian Congress voted
Friday to repeal two
decrees that opened up
communally owned native
lands to private
investment and that
triggered a wave of
protests this month by
indigenous people in
Amazon jungle provinces.
The vote was a rare
instance of cooperation
between opposition
lawmakers and
legislators from parties
that up to now have been
allied with the
government, who voted to
overturn the decrees on
the argument that they
undermined the rights of
native communities.
Sixty-six lawmakers
voted to revoke the
decrees and 29 members
of the governing APRA
party voted against the
decision.
The decrees were adopted
by the executive branch
in an unconstitutional
manner and without
respecting indigenous
groups’ right to be
consulted prior to any
project on their land,
as established by
International Labour
Organisation (ILO)
Convention 169, which
has been ratified by
Peru.
A majority in Congress
agreed that the
government went beyond
the special powers it
was granted by
parliament as part of
the free trade agreement
negotiated with the
United States, when it
vetoed the legislature’s
original vote against
the two laws.
Under the decrees, a
mechanism created in the
1990s, which allowed
indigenous communities
to sell or lease
collectively-owned land
to third parties if
approved by two-thirds
of the members of a
community assembly, was
modified to permit sales
with the votes of just
50 percent plus one of
the assembly members.
"The executive branch
ran roughshod over
Congress, native
communities and
international
conventions," said Roger
Nájar, the new chairman
of the parliamentary
committee on Andean and
Amazon peoples and the
environment.
In Nájar’s view, the
government’s "arrogant
attitude" fuelled the
indigenous protests held
in different parts of
the country’s Amazon
jungle region from Aug.
9-20, where they
occupied energy industry
installations and took
police officers hostage.
The government declared
a 30-day state of
emergency on Monday,
Aug. 18 in several
provinces to crack down
on the protests.
The indigenous groups
did not call off their
demonstrations until
Wednesday, Aug. 20,
after the president of
Congress, Luis Velásquez
Quesquen, promised that
the legislature would
debate the repeal of the
two decrees.
"The right way of doing
things would have been
to hold talks,
decentralised sessions
(with native
organisations before the
decrees were approved).
We definitely do not
approve of the protests,
but they were caused by
the government," said
Congresswoman Gabriela
Pérez del Solar, of the
National Unity (UN)
party.
But the APRA legislators
argued that the decrees
had been approved in
order to give indigenous
communities in the
jungle and highlands
regions the same tools
that campesinos (peasant
farmers) in the coastal
region have, that allow
them to rent or sell
their land.
"This is special
treatment for certain
cultures. Are native
people minors? What
these decrees were aimed
at is a revolutionary
change to pull them out
of poverty. The law has
to be the same for
everyone; that’s what
the rule of law is all
about," argued
Congressman Mauricio
Mulder, the
secretary-general of the
governing party.
Using the same
arguments, President
Alan García said
Wednesday that Congress
was going to make "a
huge mistake" if it
overturned the decrees.
And on Friday morning,
before the result of the
vote in parliament was
announced, the president
of the National
Confederation of Private
Business Institutions (CONFIEP),
Jaime Cáceres, called on
the government to impose
its authority.
The spokesman for the
ruling party
legislators, Aurelio
Pastor, told the press
that the government
would veto Friday’s
parliamentary vote.
"By doing that, the only
thing the government is
going to achieve is to
generate ill-feeling in
the country. It is just
provoking the indigenous
people; that’s called
state terrorism,"
Congressman Víctor
Mayorga, who headed the
working group that
originally assessed the
constitutionality of the
decrees, told IPS.
Mayorga explained that
he recommended on Jun. 9
that the two decrees be
declared
unconstitutional, but
that the rest of the
legislators in his
working group did not
review his proposal for
a joint statement that
could have been sent to
the constitution
committee and then to
the floor of the
legislature, where they
could have been repealed
without the risk of a
government veto.
However, Mayorga
explained to IPS that
the legislature can
overrule the
government’s veto.
Legislator Gloria Ramos
told IPS that "our
country is
multicultural. But the
political programmes and
policies are implemented
as if it were
homogeneous. We must
promote a model of
development that is
based on who we really
are. The cultural
element must be taken
into consideration as
the basis of our
development."
"If the government
vetoes the law, it will
not be respecting
democracy," said Ramos.
"The president has to
consider that the kind
of investment it is
promoting, which is so
far removed from our
reality and our
diversity, does not
necessarily generate
development."
In the Amazon jungle
region, hundreds of
indigenous people
celebrated the
parliamentary decision.
"This is a demonstration
that the people came
together to make their
voices heard. There are
no losers or winners
here; the Peruvian
people as a whole have
taken a huge step,"
Alberto Pizango, the
president of the
Interethnic Association
for the Development of
the Peruvian Rainforest
(AIDESEP), which led
this month’s protests,
told the press.
Pizango urged the
government to take
indigenous peoples’
demands into account in
its public policies
because "we don't want
to be a social burden;
we want to solve our
pressing problems."
The vice president of
AIDESEP, Robert
Guimaraes, added that
the next step should be
the creation of a multi-sectoral
committee to address the
rest of the demands of
the country’s indigenous
people, and the
establishment of a team
of experts to implement
ILO Convention 169.
In July, the Peruvian
ombudsman’s office had
filed a legal challenge
against the two decrees
in the Constitutional
Court.
In a legal analysis, the
non-governmental
Amazonian Centre for
Anthropology and
Practical Application
warned that the two
decrees were
unconstitutional and
contravened Convention
169 and article 19 of
the United Nations
Declaration on the
Rights of Indigenous
Peoples.
According to the report,
the failure to
previously consult
indigenous communities
prior to authorising or
undertaking activities
on native lands is one
of the causes of social
and environmental
conflicts and unrest.
The government must also
furnish the National
Institute for the
Development of Andean,
Amazon and Afro-Peruvian
Peoples (INDEPA),
created to represent
these communities in the
state, with real powers,
says the report.
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