This spring, the Shuar Arutam People (PSHA) elected its new government council. Jaime Palomino was chosen as its new president, succeeding Josefina Tunki who concluded her mandate as the first woman president after leading the struggle in defense of the Shuar territory for four years.

The congress acknowledged and celebrated Josefina for having made their struggle known nationally and internationally, and Amazon Watch presented her with thousands of personal messages of gratitude from all over the world. Click here to view a powerful video highlighting some of these messages.

Amazon Watch has accompanied the PSHA’s struggle against mining on their territories for many years, and we are committed to supporting them in this next phase of their work.

This is an important moment for celebration. It is monumental that the PSHA ratified its resistance to mining in its territory because the community has faced intense divide-and-conquer strategies from companies and the Ecuadorian government. Jaime forcefully denounced this in a Shuar assembly, saying that mining “has threatened us in all corners of the Shuar Territory, breaking family ties and sowing poverty and environmental and social pollution.”