[News] The Rainforest’s Cry: Amazon Uprising

[Anti-Imperialist News]

The Rainforest’s Cry: Amazon Uprising and 
Opposing Perspectives of Development in Peru
http://upsidedownworld.org/main/content/view/1888/1/


Written by Irene Arce Claux, Translation by Timothy Erskine
Wednesday, 03 June 2009

The indefinite strike called on April 9 by the 
Amazon's indigenous people has become a central 
concern for Peru's principal state powers because 
petroleum headquarters have been seized, 
riverways blocked, highways picketed, and 
demonstrations displaying spears and banners have 
called for the repeal of 10 legislative decrees 
that they consider dangerous for the rainforest, as well as their communities.

Even though the Congress’s Constitutional 
Commission (Comisión de Constitución del 
Congreso) declared  the Forest and Wild Fauna Law 
unconstitutional, its repeal is not effective 
until it is discussed and voted with full 
parliamentary participation. However, there 
remain nine regulations that the indigenous hope 
to see repealed, and which were declared 
unconstitutional by a multiparty congressional commission in December 2008.

Alberto Pizango, president of the Interethnic 
Development Association of the Peruvian 
Rainforest (Aidesep), who heads the movement, 
maintains that the protests will go on 
indefinitely as long as the demands of the protesters are ignored.

According to Pizango, the government should lift 
the state of emergency that has been established 
since May 9 in five Amazonian regions, the 
Congress must repeal the controversial decrees, 
and there should be a sit-down discussion 
concerning a different path to development in the Amazon. [i]

Congress granted an exceptional amount of 
authority to the Executive Branch at the end of 
2007, allowing it to make legal adjustments in 
the regulatory framework of the Free Trade Agreement with the United States.

Of the 99 legislative decrees presented by the 
Executive until mid-2008, ten would endanger 
reserved forest spaces to benefit investment in 
large extractive industries, such as petroleum, 
mining, logging, gas, and biofuels.

The organizations that have aligned themselves 
with the Aidesep-led protest maintain that these 
decrees violate Agreement 169 of the 
International Labour Organization, which was 
signed and ratified by the Peruvian state in 
order to affirm the right of indigenous 
communities to be consulted on matters that directly affect their localities.

On May 15, the conflict between the Amazon 
peoples and the central government came to a head 
when Pizango, seeing that agreements were not 
being made between the two parties, called for a 
rebellion producing fears of bloodshed in the 
regions declared to be in a state of emergency, 
where the presence of police and the military is greatest.

The following day, the spokespersons of Aidesep 
softened their tone after signing a contract with 
the Defensoría del Pueblo (People’s Protection 
Office), and said that the call for rebellion had 
been excessive. Due to the actions of Pizango, 
the Prosecutor’s Office and the Prime Minister’s 
Office (PCM, for its acronym in Spanish) 
denounced him this week for sedition, rebellion, 
and conspiracy against the Peruvian state. [ii]

Spear Wounds and Resolutions

In turn, President Alan García has declared, "I 
do not obey any corporate business group. I 
defend all Peruvians. And the lands of the Amazon 
are theirs, and their children's, they belong to 
the whole nation; the lands of the Amazon are for 
all Peruvians, not for a small group who happens 
to live there." [iii] He added that the Amazon 
mobilization, "subscribes to a backward, oligarchic ideology and vision." [iv]

Likewise, Prime Minister Yehude Simon maintained 
that the armed forces of the state would impose 
order on the zones where the indigenous had declared a rebellion in mid-May.

Simon warned: "Enough is enough. We have had 
ample patience. They have gone on with this 
stance for one month and a week. They have surely 
viewed our democracy as being weak and have 
considered that because of its weakness, the 
state has not responded to their provocations. 
But unfortunately, upon request of the people, my 
respect for democracy and the constitution, we must proceed with action." [v]

After the call for insurgency was suspended and 
as days passed by, Simon adopted a more 
conciliatory tone, insisting to Aidesep that it 
should name its representatives for a 
multisectorial sit-down discussion [vi] with the 
goal of discussing how the Amazon can be 
developed in the short, medium, and long terms.
Nevertheless, the Prime Minister considered the 
repeal of the legislative decrees "difficult" 
because there are sectors that would reap 
benefits from them [vii]. At most, Simon 
indicated that modifications could be made in 
order to abate the fears of the Amazonian communities.

In this regard, Pizango says: "With the PCM we 
have made important advances because Supreme 
Resolution 031 has finally gone through and it 
gives us 15 days to choose the representatives 
that will constitute a multisectorial commission 
that will work on issues of education, health, 
and agriculture... but the roundtable that they 
are setting up should not mislead us, it is not 
sufficient to suspend the demonstrations." [viii]

Juan Ossio, anthropologist and one of the members 
of the consultant committee for President García, 
considers that: "It is very important to 
formulate appropriate legislation that imposes 
order on the rainforest’s productive activity. 
Therefore, the efforts of the government can not 
be excessive when there still is increasing 
laxity toward drug-trafficking, illegal 
lumbering, and informal mining activities." [ix] 
Basically, he is pushing for order. No more law of the jungle.

According to Ossio’s analysis with respect to the 
impasse: "The conflict can be explained by, on 
one hand, the absolutist attitudes of Aidesep 
that, being a simple NGO, has become the prime 
representative entity of all the native peoples 
that live in the Amazon and, on the other hand, a 
government that aspires to govern for all 
Peruvians, procuring its economic growth 
especially during the current global crisis while 
lacking a sufficient understanding of the 
multicultural nature of the nation." [x]

To that, Pizango states that, "Aidesep, for the 
indigenous world, is not considered an NGO; we 
consider that it is an association of interests 
with an institutionality that stems from the 
Amazonian indigenous movement." [xi]

It is worth remembering that Pizango is the "apu" 
(chief) elected by the leaders of 1200 native 
communities in the Amazon that comprise a population of 350,000 people.

Order and Progress

When the Amazonian villages staged a protest in 
August 2008 that lasted nearly a month, there was 
hardly an echo to be heard in Lima. This year, 
the conflict has gained wider media coverage and 
has created a space within which two models of 
development are clashing; one that is being 
pushed by the state, and one valued and supported 
by the Amazonian populations.

Today, while the government and Aidesep seek to 
arrive at agreements, fluvial routes for 
petroleum carriers continue to be blocked off, as 
well as petroleum stations numbers 5 and 6 in 
Loreto, which form part of the Nor Peruvian 
pipeline. Likewise, Pluspetrol announced on May 
20 that its operations would be paralyzed due to the strike.

"Unfortunately, it must be this way in order that 
word reaches mass media. These peoples that have 
been seen as marginal are now the protagonists," 
said Margarita Benavides, anthropologist and 
co-director of the Instituto del Bien Común (Common Good Institute).

"The government, in place of having a discussion 
about civilization, should change and be more 
willing to dialogue and not sit around waiting 
for such situations to arise, in which peoples 
get tired of being constantly deceived," added Benavides. [xii]

In turn, Adda Chuecas Cabrera, director of the 
Centro Amazónico de Antropología y Aplicación 
Práctica (Amazon Center for Anthropology and 
Practical Application-CAAAP), has stated: "The 
greater part of the indigenous territories have 
natural resources that are the source of 
conflicts with oil and mining companies, and 
logging concessions. And although the Defensoría 
del Pueblo says that most of Peru’s conflicts are 
socio-environmental, the Peruvian state does not 
have a development policy that is inclusive to the indigenous peoples." [xiii]

Throughout its history, "development" in Peru has 
been carried out by extracting finite natural 
resources. In the 19th century there was a boom 
in guano and saltpeter; at the beginning of the 
20th century, it was rubber. Recurrently, one 
sees cycles of prosperity and decadence, such as 
efforts to "colonize" the rainforest and the 
expansion of the agricultural frontier, all in the name of progress.

What Federico More once said in Zoocracy and 
Cannibalism about ex-president Augusto B. Leguía 
(1919-1930), also known as "the builder of the 
new Peru," could easily be applied to President 
García Pérez: "He was a great mayor for the 
Republic. If given the chance, he would have left 
little of the rainforests un-asphalted and 
converted almost all of the Amazon into a 
swimming pool for some grand high-society club." [xiv]

For more information concerning the decrees that 
the Amazonian peoples consider damaging, see: 
“Informe legal sobre los decretos legislativos 
1090, 1064, 1080, 1081 y 1089” 
in-<http://www.caaap.org.pe/archivos/Comision_Consultiva_Informe-1_DecretosLegislativos_Nov2008.pdf>http://www.caaap.org.pe/archivos/Comision_Consultiva_Informe-1_DecretosLegislativos_Nov2008.pdf

Notes

<https://webmail.unibo.edu.ar/exchange/iarce/Borradores/RE:%20article....EML?Cmd=reply&Create=0#_ednref1>[i] 
Interview from 5-20-09.

<https://webmail.unibo.edu.ar/exchange/iarce/Borradores/RE:%20article....EML?Cmd=reply&Create=0#_ednref2>[ii] 
“Procurador de la PCM denunció a Pizango por 
rebelión y conspiración”, El Comercio, 5-20-09

<https://webmail.unibo.edu.ar/exchange/iarce/Borradores/RE:%20article....EML?Cmd=reply&Create=0#_ednref3>[iii] 
“Alan García: Yo no obedezco a ningún grupo 
corporativo empresarial”, Coordinadora Nacional de Radio, 5-16-09.

<https://webmail.unibo.edu.ar/exchange/iarce/Borradores/RE:%20article....EML?Cmd=reply&Create=0#_ednref4>[iv] 
Ibidem.

<https://webmail.unibo.edu.ar/exchange/iarce/Borradores/RE:%20article....EML?Cmd=reply&Create=0#_ednref5>[v] 
“Simon: ‘Fuerzas del Estado actuarán pues se 
agotó la paciencia’”, <http://www.peru.com/>www.peru.com, 5-15-09.

<https://webmail.unibo.edu.ar/exchange/iarce/Borradores/RE:%20article....EML?Cmd=reply&Create=0#_ednref6>[vi] 
“Yehude Simon instó a Aidesep a llegar un acuerdo 
sobre Ley de la Selva”, 
<http://www.peruinforma.com/>www.peruinforma.com, 5-22-2009.

<https://webmail.unibo.edu.ar/exchange/iarce/Borradores/RE:%20article....EML?Cmd=reply&Create=0#_ednref7>[vii] 
“Yehude Simon: ‘Es difícil eliminar decretos 
sobre Ley de la Selva’”, <http://www.peru.com/>www.peru.com. 5-22-2009.

<https://webmail.unibo.edu.ar/exchange/iarce/Borradores/RE:%20article....EML?Cmd=reply&Create=0#_ednref8>[viii] 
Interview from 5-20-2009.

<https://webmail.unibo.edu.ar/exchange/iarce/Borradores/RE:%20article....EML?Cmd=reply&Create=0#_ednref9>[ix] 
Brief questionnaire interview from 5-19-2009.

<https://webmail.unibo.edu.ar/exchange/iarce/Borradores/RE:%20article....EML?Cmd=reply&Create=0#_ednref10>[x] 
Ibidem.

<https://webmail.unibo.edu.ar/exchange/iarce/Borradores/RE:%20article....EML?Cmd=reply&Create=0#_ednref11>[xi] 
Interview from 5-20-2009.

<https://webmail.unibo.edu.ar/exchange/iarce/Borradores/RE:%20article....EML?Cmd=reply&Create=0#_ednref12>[xii] 
Ibidem.

<https://webmail.unibo.edu.ar/exchange/iarce/Borradores/RE:%20article....EML?Cmd=reply&Create=0#_ednref13>[xiii] 
Interview from 5-19-2009.

<https://webmail.unibo.edu.ar/exchange/iarce/Borradores/RE:%20article....EML?Cmd=reply&Create=0#_ednref14>[xiv] 
More, Federico. Zoocracia y canibalismo, 
Editorial La Llamarada, Lima, 1933, p. 9.






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