| From | Rights Action <[email protected]> |
| Subject | Miguel Ángel Bámaca remembered |
| Date | November 18, 2024 6:51 PM |
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Mam land, environment and rights defender who confronted the "monster"
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November 18, 2024
Miguel Ángel Bámaca Remembered
Mam land, environment and rights defender who confronted the “monster” Goldcorp Inc. and Canadian government policies and programs
[link removed]
Below: Testimony of Miguel Angel Bamaca, from TESTIMONIO: Canadian Mining in the Aftermath of Genocides in Guatemala
“What does this monster mean to me? It is a big invader of our natural resources of San Miguel Ixtahuacán in Mam territory. That is why I said “no.” They are endangering our existence, our health, our lives.Land for us is our mother. Our mother gives us what we live off, the honey of our lives that we survive on. We are defending our mother. All these years we’ve been defending our mother. It is our mother who gives us what we eat. It is our mother who gives us what we drink. This mother, this land, is our home. This is our house.”
Miguel’s home in Siete Platos, during UNBC-Rights Action field school 2018
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Jackie McVicar sent up this information from the Ancestral Authorities of San Miguel Ixtahuacan. Jackie worked for years with Breaking the Silence ([link removed]) in support of communities devastated by the open-pit, cyanide-leaching “Marlin mine”.
“On November 6, the Council of Ancestral Authorities of San Miguel Ixtahuacán announced ([link removed]) the passing of Miguel Angel Bamaca, a Maya Mam human rights defender remembered for his struggle in defense of territory. Miguel Angel was also an Ancestral Doctor and community health practitioner, a member of the Council of Ancestral Authorities of San Miguel Ixtahuacán, who studied political science and Legal Pluralism in national universities. He was a petitioner before the Inter-American Human Rights Commission to protect the rights of Maya Mam and Maya Sipakapense communities, invaded and ravaged by Canada's Goldcorp Inc. for more than a decade. Miguel Angel was a loving and devoted partner to Natalia and father of four girls, aged 2, 3, 13, and 15 and he died after a long illness with them by his side. Together they lived in Siete Platos near the Tzala River. For defending the river and territory from Goldcorp's open
pit gold mine, Miguel Angel faced violent attacks, threats, and intimidations. He will be fondly remembered for his knowledge of traditional medicines and the land, his love for his community and family, and his commitment to the defense of territory.”
*******
From 2004-2018, Goldcorp Inc. (then a Canadian mining giant) profited from a whole lot of corruption and violence (including killings), environmental devastation and (now inter-generational) health harms, made gargantuan profits for Canadian and global north shareholders and investors (including countless pension funds). In 2017, the Marlin mine was shut and Goldcorp was bought out by and amalgamated into Newmont Gold Corporation (Greenwood Village, Colorado USA). Goldcorp Inc. never paid any reparations for the violence, devastation and harms they caused and profited from.
TESTIMONIO: Canadian Mining in the Aftermath of Genocides in Guatemala
(edited by Catherine Nolin & Grahame Russell, Between The Lines, 2021)
On pages 85-87, we published this testimony of Miguel:
My name is Miguel Ángel Bámaca and I live in Siete Platos. I have lived in resistance to this monster since 1998.
What does this monster mean to me? It is a big invader of our natural resources of San Miguel Ixtahuacán in Mam territory. That is why I said “no.” They are endangering our existence, our health, our lives. This monster is a great violator of our human rights, who without consultation pushed through their project. They have violated us in so many ways. In 2010, they attacked Diodora [Hernández] and criminalized us.
They wanted to kill me—on July 14, 2010. It was the same week as the attack on Diodora. They intimidate us in so many ways. Spying on us, following us. They are always there with their eyes on us.
On May 20, about four hundred of us blocked the road between San Antonio and Siete Platos. Well, that was the cause of the death threats we later received. At least thirteen compañeros were injured, probably more, but they didn’t have the strength to present themselves, out of fear. I wasn’t scared. I knew the truth. No, I won’t hide myself.
We are trying to pressure the government to make Montana Exploradora [Guatemalan subsidiary of Goldcorp and name used most often by those in resistance] pay for their damages. So, we are pressuring our government. But, we are frustrated that we have to pressure our government to do the right thing, and act like a government and hold the wrong-doer accountable.
Montana does not accept its errors. They do not accept that they have done anything wrong here. And the government is not doing anything to pressure them to accept that it has done things wrong here and provide reparation of some sort.
I am sharing with you some of all that we’ve lived through here, and because I have been so involved for so long, I am now part of the dialogue process at the municipal level. That is not going well. But that is my role today besides getting on with my life. I am a formal member of the dialogue process. I am also a member of FREDEMI which is one of the organizations that grew out of the resistance.
We have dozens of natural springs that have dried up, which the communities depend on, even in the dry season. 2015, 2016, 2017, 2018 . . . The natural springs are not coming back, even though the mine stopped a year ago . . . I don’t know what will happen in the future. But they have not come back yet.
Land for us is our mother. Our mother gives us what we live off, the honey of our lives that we survive on. We are defending our mother. All these years we’ve been defending our mother. It is our mother who gives us what we eat. It is our mother who gives us what we drink. This mother, this land, is our home. This is our house.
Our continuing resistance and desire to defend our mother, even though it is hard, is because we have pride in ourselves. We have self-esteem in ourselves. And we have no other option.
This is our home. We know that we have been dealing with a lot of people who sit in offices and wear suits and ties. That’s their world over there. But they know nothing of our world here. We know that we belong here and that we have no options but to fight and defend this life.
We get strength also from other people in other regions and other parts of the country who are also resisting and fighting back. We are with them and they are with us. We get some of our strength from that. We are also thankful for support of some international organizations. We have some hope from the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights. Even though we didn’t achieve what they set out for us, the people who work there were able to remind us that we are right in our struggle and that we are right to struggle for our land and our children’s land and our grandchildren’s land.
We were not allowed to do a municipal consulta here in San Miguel Ixtahuacán nor even consultas at the village level—though some were done clandestinely. Our authorities didn’t allow us to do it, like there were in other places like Sipakapa, Huehuetenango, other places.
It is our right do this but what does the government say? They say that we “recognize your right to do consultations but they are not binding.” How is it possible that our consultations are not binding?!
Repression against the resistance was all around, connected to the consultation demands, but all around the struggle. As I mentioned earlier, February 28, 2011, we did another roadblock to try to get our rights respected. There was very serious violence against a lot of us. We had a roadblock right down near the bridge over there at Siete Platos where I live.
Now, those guys over there, the Mejía family who own the hotel over there [points across the road], at the time were hired gunmen for the company to divide communities. The Mejía brothers were part of the group who, with some company security guards, came down and started shooting up the place, beating up people, threatening people. It was a really terrible day of violence, trying to break our peaceful roadblock.
Aniseto [López] suffered immensely. He was hit over the head with a pistol, kidnapped, and detained not even by the police but by people connected to the company. They forced him to sign documents, to denounce the resistance. There was a lot of blood spilled that day. But no one was killed that day.
And now this Mejía family are now aligning themselves with the resistance, demanding reparations from the mining company!
Now that the mining company is gone . . . the struggle, the threats, the criminalization . . . they haven’t paid for any of the damages and this whole region is worse off than before. People like the Mejías want to join our demands for reparations. We don’t all agree if they should or shouldn’t be allowed back into our circle.
Aniseto’s position is that they were wrong, they committed errors, but it is our responsibility to see if we can open the door for them so that they can come back and join in. Let us learn together.
Through all this, the “official” dialogue process is not moving forward. And for all the damage and harms, there is no justice. Justice is a pending issue. We survive on what we sell in this little store. My wife is asking, “How will we feed the kids?”
“A frightening vision of the world’s insatiable hunger for gold.” Cinema Politica
Gold Fever (2013, 83 Mins) witnesses the arrival of Goldcorp Inc. (now owned by Newmont Corporation) to the remote Mayan village of San Miguel Ixtahuacan in Guatemala. Together with members of their community, and in the face of grave consequences, Diodora, Crisanta and Gregoria resist the threat to their ancestral lands.
* Northland Films: [link removed]
* Youtube: [link removed]
More info: JT Haines, [email protected] (mailto:[email protected]) , www.northlandfilms.com
‘Fighting a huge monster’: Mine battle in Guatemala became a playbook for polluters
by Nina Lakhani, The Guardian, 18 Aug 2023
[link removed]
“The Marlin mine was built in the early 2000s after the end of Guatemala’s brutal 36-year civil war as part of a wave of internationally financed extractive projects agreed, critics say, without proper consultation, environmental safeguards or economic benefits for local communities.”
“Natural resources on Indigenous lands have been exploited since colonial settlers first attacked Latin America, creating wealth for a few, while fuelling violence, displacement and poverty for most.”
“The Marlin mine, which made its owner, the Canadian gold-mining firm Goldcorp, billions of dollars before closing in 2017, was one of the earliest documented cases of a transnational corporation – and its state allies – weaponising the legal system against environmental defenders. […] The violence and the criminalisation caused terror and put the brakes on the social movement at a critical moment. We were fighting against a huge monster, and we couldn’t stop them,” said Salomón Bámaca
Tax-Deductible Donations (Canada & U.S.)
To support land and environmental defenders, and human rights, justice and democracy defense struggles in Honduras and Guatemala, make check to "Rights Action" and mail to:
* U.S.: Box 50887, Washington DC, 20091-0887
* Canada: Box 82858, RPO Cabbagetown Toronto, ON, M5A 3Y2
Credit-Card Donations: [link removed]
Direct deposits, write to: [email protected] (mailto:[email protected])
Donations of securities, write to: [email protected] (mailto:[email protected])
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Please share and re-post this information
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More info: [email protected] (mailto:[email protected]) , www.rightsaction.org
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Previous e-Newsletters: [link removed]
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[link removed]: https%3A%2F%2Fmailchi.mp%2Frightsaction%2Fmiguel-angel-bamaca-remembered Tweet ([link removed]: https%3A%2F%2Fmailchi.mp%2Frightsaction%2Fmiguel-angel-bamaca-remembered)
[link removed] Forward ([link removed])
November 18, 2024
Miguel Ángel Bámaca Remembered
Mam land, environment and rights defender who confronted the “monster” Goldcorp Inc. and Canadian government policies and programs
[link removed]
Below: Testimony of Miguel Angel Bamaca, from TESTIMONIO: Canadian Mining in the Aftermath of Genocides in Guatemala
“What does this monster mean to me? It is a big invader of our natural resources of San Miguel Ixtahuacán in Mam territory. That is why I said “no.” They are endangering our existence, our health, our lives.Land for us is our mother. Our mother gives us what we live off, the honey of our lives that we survive on. We are defending our mother. All these years we’ve been defending our mother. It is our mother who gives us what we eat. It is our mother who gives us what we drink. This mother, this land, is our home. This is our house.”
Miguel’s home in Siete Platos, during UNBC-Rights Action field school 2018
*******
Please share and re-post this information
*******
Jackie McVicar sent up this information from the Ancestral Authorities of San Miguel Ixtahuacan. Jackie worked for years with Breaking the Silence ([link removed]) in support of communities devastated by the open-pit, cyanide-leaching “Marlin mine”.
“On November 6, the Council of Ancestral Authorities of San Miguel Ixtahuacán announced ([link removed]) the passing of Miguel Angel Bamaca, a Maya Mam human rights defender remembered for his struggle in defense of territory. Miguel Angel was also an Ancestral Doctor and community health practitioner, a member of the Council of Ancestral Authorities of San Miguel Ixtahuacán, who studied political science and Legal Pluralism in national universities. He was a petitioner before the Inter-American Human Rights Commission to protect the rights of Maya Mam and Maya Sipakapense communities, invaded and ravaged by Canada's Goldcorp Inc. for more than a decade. Miguel Angel was a loving and devoted partner to Natalia and father of four girls, aged 2, 3, 13, and 15 and he died after a long illness with them by his side. Together they lived in Siete Platos near the Tzala River. For defending the river and territory from Goldcorp's open
pit gold mine, Miguel Angel faced violent attacks, threats, and intimidations. He will be fondly remembered for his knowledge of traditional medicines and the land, his love for his community and family, and his commitment to the defense of territory.”
*******
From 2004-2018, Goldcorp Inc. (then a Canadian mining giant) profited from a whole lot of corruption and violence (including killings), environmental devastation and (now inter-generational) health harms, made gargantuan profits for Canadian and global north shareholders and investors (including countless pension funds). In 2017, the Marlin mine was shut and Goldcorp was bought out by and amalgamated into Newmont Gold Corporation (Greenwood Village, Colorado USA). Goldcorp Inc. never paid any reparations for the violence, devastation and harms they caused and profited from.
TESTIMONIO: Canadian Mining in the Aftermath of Genocides in Guatemala
(edited by Catherine Nolin & Grahame Russell, Between The Lines, 2021)
On pages 85-87, we published this testimony of Miguel:
My name is Miguel Ángel Bámaca and I live in Siete Platos. I have lived in resistance to this monster since 1998.
What does this monster mean to me? It is a big invader of our natural resources of San Miguel Ixtahuacán in Mam territory. That is why I said “no.” They are endangering our existence, our health, our lives. This monster is a great violator of our human rights, who without consultation pushed through their project. They have violated us in so many ways. In 2010, they attacked Diodora [Hernández] and criminalized us.
They wanted to kill me—on July 14, 2010. It was the same week as the attack on Diodora. They intimidate us in so many ways. Spying on us, following us. They are always there with their eyes on us.
On May 20, about four hundred of us blocked the road between San Antonio and Siete Platos. Well, that was the cause of the death threats we later received. At least thirteen compañeros were injured, probably more, but they didn’t have the strength to present themselves, out of fear. I wasn’t scared. I knew the truth. No, I won’t hide myself.
We are trying to pressure the government to make Montana Exploradora [Guatemalan subsidiary of Goldcorp and name used most often by those in resistance] pay for their damages. So, we are pressuring our government. But, we are frustrated that we have to pressure our government to do the right thing, and act like a government and hold the wrong-doer accountable.
Montana does not accept its errors. They do not accept that they have done anything wrong here. And the government is not doing anything to pressure them to accept that it has done things wrong here and provide reparation of some sort.
I am sharing with you some of all that we’ve lived through here, and because I have been so involved for so long, I am now part of the dialogue process at the municipal level. That is not going well. But that is my role today besides getting on with my life. I am a formal member of the dialogue process. I am also a member of FREDEMI which is one of the organizations that grew out of the resistance.
We have dozens of natural springs that have dried up, which the communities depend on, even in the dry season. 2015, 2016, 2017, 2018 . . . The natural springs are not coming back, even though the mine stopped a year ago . . . I don’t know what will happen in the future. But they have not come back yet.
Land for us is our mother. Our mother gives us what we live off, the honey of our lives that we survive on. We are defending our mother. All these years we’ve been defending our mother. It is our mother who gives us what we eat. It is our mother who gives us what we drink. This mother, this land, is our home. This is our house.
Our continuing resistance and desire to defend our mother, even though it is hard, is because we have pride in ourselves. We have self-esteem in ourselves. And we have no other option.
This is our home. We know that we have been dealing with a lot of people who sit in offices and wear suits and ties. That’s their world over there. But they know nothing of our world here. We know that we belong here and that we have no options but to fight and defend this life.
We get strength also from other people in other regions and other parts of the country who are also resisting and fighting back. We are with them and they are with us. We get some of our strength from that. We are also thankful for support of some international organizations. We have some hope from the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights. Even though we didn’t achieve what they set out for us, the people who work there were able to remind us that we are right in our struggle and that we are right to struggle for our land and our children’s land and our grandchildren’s land.
We were not allowed to do a municipal consulta here in San Miguel Ixtahuacán nor even consultas at the village level—though some were done clandestinely. Our authorities didn’t allow us to do it, like there were in other places like Sipakapa, Huehuetenango, other places.
It is our right do this but what does the government say? They say that we “recognize your right to do consultations but they are not binding.” How is it possible that our consultations are not binding?!
Repression against the resistance was all around, connected to the consultation demands, but all around the struggle. As I mentioned earlier, February 28, 2011, we did another roadblock to try to get our rights respected. There was very serious violence against a lot of us. We had a roadblock right down near the bridge over there at Siete Platos where I live.
Now, those guys over there, the Mejía family who own the hotel over there [points across the road], at the time were hired gunmen for the company to divide communities. The Mejía brothers were part of the group who, with some company security guards, came down and started shooting up the place, beating up people, threatening people. It was a really terrible day of violence, trying to break our peaceful roadblock.
Aniseto [López] suffered immensely. He was hit over the head with a pistol, kidnapped, and detained not even by the police but by people connected to the company. They forced him to sign documents, to denounce the resistance. There was a lot of blood spilled that day. But no one was killed that day.
And now this Mejía family are now aligning themselves with the resistance, demanding reparations from the mining company!
Now that the mining company is gone . . . the struggle, the threats, the criminalization . . . they haven’t paid for any of the damages and this whole region is worse off than before. People like the Mejías want to join our demands for reparations. We don’t all agree if they should or shouldn’t be allowed back into our circle.
Aniseto’s position is that they were wrong, they committed errors, but it is our responsibility to see if we can open the door for them so that they can come back and join in. Let us learn together.
Through all this, the “official” dialogue process is not moving forward. And for all the damage and harms, there is no justice. Justice is a pending issue. We survive on what we sell in this little store. My wife is asking, “How will we feed the kids?”
“A frightening vision of the world’s insatiable hunger for gold.” Cinema Politica
Gold Fever (2013, 83 Mins) witnesses the arrival of Goldcorp Inc. (now owned by Newmont Corporation) to the remote Mayan village of San Miguel Ixtahuacan in Guatemala. Together with members of their community, and in the face of grave consequences, Diodora, Crisanta and Gregoria resist the threat to their ancestral lands.
* Northland Films: [link removed]
* Youtube: [link removed]
More info: JT Haines, [email protected] (mailto:[email protected]) , www.northlandfilms.com
‘Fighting a huge monster’: Mine battle in Guatemala became a playbook for polluters
by Nina Lakhani, The Guardian, 18 Aug 2023
[link removed]
“The Marlin mine was built in the early 2000s after the end of Guatemala’s brutal 36-year civil war as part of a wave of internationally financed extractive projects agreed, critics say, without proper consultation, environmental safeguards or economic benefits for local communities.”
“Natural resources on Indigenous lands have been exploited since colonial settlers first attacked Latin America, creating wealth for a few, while fuelling violence, displacement and poverty for most.”
“The Marlin mine, which made its owner, the Canadian gold-mining firm Goldcorp, billions of dollars before closing in 2017, was one of the earliest documented cases of a transnational corporation – and its state allies – weaponising the legal system against environmental defenders. […] The violence and the criminalisation caused terror and put the brakes on the social movement at a critical moment. We were fighting against a huge monster, and we couldn’t stop them,” said Salomón Bámaca
Tax-Deductible Donations (Canada & U.S.)
To support land and environmental defenders, and human rights, justice and democracy defense struggles in Honduras and Guatemala, make check to "Rights Action" and mail to:
* U.S.: Box 50887, Washington DC, 20091-0887
* Canada: Box 82858, RPO Cabbagetown Toronto, ON, M5A 3Y2
Credit-Card Donations: [link removed]
Direct deposits, write to: [email protected] (mailto:[email protected])
Donations of securities, write to: [email protected] (mailto:[email protected])
*******
Please share and re-post this information
*******
More info: [email protected] (mailto:[email protected]) , www.rightsaction.org
e-Newsletter: [link removed]
Previous e-Newsletters: [link removed]
[link removed]
[link removed]
[link removed] ([link removed])
[link removed]
[link removed] Facebook ([link removed])
[link removed] Twitter ([link removed])
[link removed] Website ([link removed])
[link removed] Instagram ([link removed])
[link removed] YouTube ([link removed])
============================================================
Copyright © 2024 Rights Action, All rights reserved.
You are receiving this email because you are one of our subscriptor
Our mailing address is:
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20091-0887
Washington, DC 0
USA
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