PUERTO EDEN
KAWESQAR COMUNITY
PRESENTATION AT
THE LATINO PARLIAMENT
Punta Arenas, Chile, April 26th,
2012
"CHILE´S
HISTORICAL DEBT WITH SOUTHERN CANOEISTS
COMUNTIES: CURRENT
CONDITIONS "
We truly Thank
PARLATINO for the opportunity to present the features and conditions of our
race, one of the most endangered Species and one of the least known of these
latitudes.
We reside in
Puerto Eden, a small coastal village that is located at coordinates 49 ° 08 'S
and 74 ° 25', on the Southern entrance to Messier Channel and immediately East
of Wellington Island. Puerto Eden is the only population of Bernardo O'Higgins
National Park, the largest protected wilderness area in the country and one of
the largest on the planet, a biological reservoir of water resources are in
this territories and still unexplored. East of Puerto Eden, the Southern Ice
Field is located, yet unbounded place which constitutes an important global reserve
of fresh water, not counting its strategic importance for the whole region.
Our Community in
Puerto Eden is the latest sociological community of this ethnic group. The
fourteen people who have fought for the preservation of our culture live here.
We are one of the surviving populations of an extensive process of
extermination of the five ethnic groups originate to Patagonia.
We live in a
landscape. But living conditions are extremely difficult. Town communications
are seriously flawed. Just a ferry serves the community, service which is
interrupted many times by different maters. When this happens, our isolation lasts
up to several weeks. We lack adequate basic services. Electric power is
supplied by a turbine, which at greatest demand does not keep up with the needs
of the locals. Drinking water, despite the high natural availability of it, is
a service that also presents failures. There is no sanitation services nor
wastewater treatment, which has led the Bay of Puerto Eden to have trouble with
its pollution conditions.
Moreover, the
precarious housing for the resident Kawesqar families were donated by a Belgian
foundation at the early 1990s. Up today houses are badly damaged. We have not been able to get a
financial initiative to recover these houses - which is a culturally relevant
issue - even though the Community has developed a massive amount of projects
for this purpose.
"Professor
Miguel Contreras Montesinos School " provides Primary Schooling Education,
making big efforts on this due to local conditions and recognition of their
students as descendants of original people. However, Secondary and Higher Education
haves to be taken on the Continent and even beyond the regional limits. We
recently signed a cooperation agreement with the Magallanes University, which
we hope to implement effectively soon, to provide granting of scholarships for
the Community as well as the development of scientific research activities in
full compliance with the rights of the community over their environment and
their culture.
We are,
however, a living community. We develop hard-cultural initiatives and rescue
our traditions, despite the threats from the environment and others who affect
our language, traditions and territory.
I would like to
refer to the Kawesqar Territory as a huge challenge to preservation and
protection.
It is important
to note to the audience that Kawesqar people territoriality needs to be
understood from their culture. As a counterpart to the extermination of nomad
hunters, which were brought to its total extinction towards the 1940s, there
are still two sociological canoeists nomadic communities of indigenous people on
the Channels and Magallanes fjords: Puerto Williams Yagan Community and us, Puerto Eden Kawésqar Community.
The
geographical dispersion, mobility and territorial geography used by our ethnic comunitiy,
helped us to survive extermination of native Patagonian populations. However,
missionary activity and sedentary practice to which we are subjected, meant
that we were forced to abandon gradually our nomadism, being replaced on
missions run by churches or religious cults of European origin. By the year
1920, the Missionary activity concluded, our population had dwindled to
permanent or semi-permanent settlements, such as Jetarkte, on Wellington Island
and Rinconada Bulnes, in the Brunswick Peninsula.
Sedentarization
policies were intensified in the last fifty years, induced precisely by the
creation of our town of Puerto Eden, between 1949 and 1969.
As you can
easily understand, sedentarism and such a remote & poor village has been a
progressive weakening for Kawesqar population. One of the consequences we noted
is Kawesqar Diaspora, with an obvious Generational & Cultural Gap. In fact,
this has as results, that the number of recognized and accepted members of the
Kawesqar Community does not exceed 120 people and, in a high percentage, of a
second or third generation.
We are
clustered in urbanization centers, breaking ties with all our nomadic traditions.
We also face huge impoverishment and difficulties to access to various social
and health services.
INTRODUCTION TO
KAWESQAR CULTURE:
I want to introduce you to some of
the ideas on Kawesqar conception of territory as a Dual Entity dominated by the
Marine Environment.
Kawesqar Culture
is based on its relationship with the Marine environment and the coastal area. The
sea is for our people a communication media and source of livelihood. It is
also a scenario to our worldview. Therefore, the area included in the channels
and Magallanes fjords (jáutok), as well as open to the Pacific coast (málte)
are defined and conceptualized in our culture. In those places manifestations
of our culture stand, in the form of opportunities for fishing and hunting,
harvesting, lambing, temporary camping, cemeteries and Taboo places. The
coastal area and the sea, its waters and resources, are constitutive of our
territory.
This shows an
important condition of our culture: our nomadism. Despite the establishment of
our community in Puerto Eden, cultural references are kept alive and demand
respect.
Thus, the Kawesqar
territory, is a likely turnover of other ancient cultures, is dominated by the
marine and coastal environment. The sea dominates the land. It is he who allows
us to get there and have temporary or permanent settlements.
This is why the
Kawesqar territory is vast at sea. Therefore covers, access to terrestrial
territory associated with it. This territory goes from the Golfo de Penas to
the Estrecho de Magallanes. Distinction must be made between Málte and Jáutok,
each with a specific contribution to the Kawesqar cosmogony. In addition, the territorry's
toponymie also is known by Kawesqar language names, often known in parallel to
the official name.
The Kawesqar
population recognizes four zones for settlements. In latitudinal terms, going
from north (aqáte) to south (sete) you will meet the Sǽlam or inhabitants of
the north, which corresponds to the people living from the Golfo de Penas to the
Canal Adalberto. Then, Kčewíte, residents in the area of southern Sǽlam, and
settling from the Canal Adalberto to the Jorge Mont Island and Strait Nelson,
the Kelǽlkčes, in the zone of Cabo de Ultima Esperanza and Tawókser, located in
the Seno de Skyring, Seno Otway and on both sides of the Estrecho de Magallanes.
Travel
narratives that have been documented from oral, show that the territory has
been covered since time immemorial for purposes of subsistence by our
population, then barter hunting products with fur traders and also using the
marine environment for shellfish harvesting and small scale fishing and trading
at the consumption areas.
In these stories,
departure points are very important and denoted as referrals, also as intermediate
and target points, before returns, are defined and that builds on the Kawesqar social construction.
This circumstance generates a nomadic
consciousness that anchors in the community and links navigation with points
where sea and land offers best conditions for hunting, gathering and fishing.
This is
especially important, because it implies a conception of the area that records
their ancestral uses and incorporates modern activities, to the extent that
these do not imply a transgression of the first. The sea and terrestrial
environment should provide a living, and is the environment in which the
community is sustainable, since it is aimed at development.
We need to expose how we got to this
endangered condition as victims of a profound process of genocide / ethnocide.
The Kawesqar
conception of territory, both: land and sea, is binary, it was not deserted at
the time of Western colonization. It was, moreover, as shown by archaeological
research, a fully controlled territory used by our people. The extent of this
territory was always associated with the practice of hunting, fishing and
gathering, which required large tracts of nomadism that would sustain the
population.
It is on that population
over which an exerted and extensive physical and symbolic violence was executed.
The Kawesqar extermination process and land occupation by European colonization
and Chileans were accompanied by physical extermination of the indigenous
population, under the assumption that we did not meet the standards allowed to
be subjects of law in the same condition of the people who invaded our
territory. This practice not only goes back to the Chilean independence, but it
especially and virulently starts from the first decades of the Republican era.
The scope of the genocide of our people is a dark chapter of the history of the
Chilean state. It is not easy to take care of such practices as one of the
grounds on which formed the legal authority of the Republic of Chile in the
southern end of the continent, demolishing the rights of an ethnia that was
settled for thousands of years in these latitudes.
The practice of
kidnapping with dead results were even admitted legally covered by the new
Republic, for the exhibition of our ancestors in Cultured Human Zoos in Europe.
This is an issue that we have been recently recognized in its full scope.
Genocide joined
a number of practices to impose the alien culture on our people. Chasing
assurance of the land allocated to settlers by the State of Chile, led
migration, and reduced our people in religious missions, which began the
process of destroying our culture, our traditions and our references, along bringing
sicknesses and death of those who were brought to these camps and foreshadowed
the worst practices that would develop Western cultures, a process that was
later reinforced by the imposition of conscription, or mandatory engagement of
our ancestors as precarious labor in agricultural or mining of central and
northern Mexico. Orphaned children were, moreover, removed from their
communities, under a condition attributed orphans to be adopted by families
outside our village, having been lost track of their final destination.
So we know
about genocide and how it was protected by the Republic of Chile, known through
the stories of our elders and the chronicles of historians and researchers. But
it recognized the full extent of the consequences he has caused to the survival
of our ethnicity. Today we are held hostage in Puerto Eden, which we consider
the principal center of our territory. There we preserved our culture and with a
huge effort the material basis of it.
The Laws of Nations protects our Rights
and I would like to refer about that right now:
It is clear
nowadays that International Laws recognize our Rights as Indigenous People and
as a minority in the Chilean State. This recognition has a Constitutional
Status, therefore, it cannot be ignored, either by law or by the regulatory
activities of the Authorities, in any form. No one can attribute themselves
greater rights than the granted by the Chilean constitution, or may ignore or
repeal Rules that have the Status of Basic Human Rights.
International Rights
protects the material and immaterial base of the Kawesqar culture. This implies
that: if Article 27 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political
Rights, on which C Chile takes part in
since 1989, recognizes minorities the right to exercise their culture, as
recognized on numerous occasions by the Human Rights Committee of the United
Nations. For the Committee, this protection of the identity of a native
population means, the deployment of positive activities to protect it, removing
obstacles for its exercise, so its not only language or religion, but in the
use of resources, and specifically mentioned including fishing and hunting, and
the right to live in reserves protected by law.
This implies
that, for the Kawesqars, the right of access to marine resources and land is
legally protected, and corresponds to the Chilean State and its authorities to
respect it and promote it effectively.
And at this
stage, I would like to remind you that when the Human Rights Committee of the
United Nations made a public call to know of other cases like the Kawesqar, about
this, they made three clear &basic statements on Rights of coastal people:
a) That sea
fishing is protected under Article 27 of the International Covenant on
Economic, Social and Cultural Rights;
b) That there
are laws that can interfere with the exercise of rights under this article;
c) That with a
broad participation and informed process by the affected communities may
authorize the establishment of regulations to rights under the same article,
but without being able to get a waiver of those rights.
Moreover, the
Convention 169 of the International Labor Organization reaffirms our rights as
coastal village. Of particular importance is the concept of territory contained
in Article 13. It combines three elements. First, it points out a mandate for
governments, in the sense that they, in implementing the Convention, must
respect the special importance that the lands and territories have for the
cultures and spiritual values of the peoples concerned. That is, it is a term
that encompasses all the actions of those governments, in its various
manifestations. Second, it highlights the difference and, at the same time
complementing the dimensions of land and territory. Under the Convention, the
territory covers the total environment of the areas which the peoples concerned
occupy or otherwise. Thus, the protection afforded by this provision exceed the
pure land and framework should be extended to all the media that is used by
these people. This would include, among other considerations: territory,
waters, oceans and their resources.
We understand
also that the coastal towns have a special right of consultation envisaged in the
existing International Law.
We have a
special right of consultation in addition to the general right of consultation
of Article 6 of the Convention. Thus, a double right belonging to the Kawesqar
Community resident in Puerto Eden, developing their livelihoods in that
blending of sea and land, and ancestral practices developed using the resources
of one dimension of our territory .
A double right
query that must meet the same minimum standards that the Committee of Experts
of the ILO has established for the implementation of Article 6 of the
Convention. That is, there must be prior consultation, informed and directed in
good faith to obtain consent. It is not, therefore, a mere right of
ratification, since the query should be allowed to influence the implementation
of the measure and properly evaluate their social, spiritual and cultural, as
well as on the environment and its protection . The Chilean Supreme Court has
been ordered around the same assumptions. Particular cases of great concern are
stage mentioned.
That is why we are
concerned about the latest actions of the Chilean Government and directly
affecting the rights of the Kawesqar Community resident in Puerto Eden.
On this issue,
we can mention, the Coastal Zoning of the Magallanes Region and Chilean
Antarctica, which was made without any consultation, no one was informed, and specifically
no one directed conversations in good
faith to reach agreement with the community. That has meant that today part of
the Kawesqar Territory have been declared as an area suitable for aquaculture,
with the subconsecuent invasion of our cultural, tangible and intangible property
and culture.
It is reported
by the political authority of Chile, that there should be a General Consultation
on the different Communities of the
Indigenous people. Yet this same attention says:
a) That they
recognize that there has been no prior consultation
b) intends to
conduct further consultation, which violates International Covenant rules Civil
and Political Rights and the Convention 169, leading to zoning rules and
declarations of suitability of aquaculture areas are in a condition that we
will seek to enforce invalid.
We have argued
about the true fallacies of justifying the lack of prior consultation of the
participation in the management of coastal and marine resources. Forget, in
fact, the Government of Chile cannot argue because as per law, it violates International
Commitments.
The members of
the Kawesqar Community of Puerto Eden are seriously concerned about ads in a
massive facility centers for intensive aquaculture salmon farming in our
territory. We already know the disastrous results in the region of Los Lagos,
and the pernicious effects on the Huilliche communities of that region. An
activity that exploits the environment to the full, ad nauseum soiled, degrades
the social and cultural environment as environmental or health crises facing
ends up turning the state itself to save them from bankruptcy. We do not want
that for our territory.
We are also
concerned to recover our rights and coastal fisheries. A reverse Diaspora of
hope and populate that space is our territory. But sustainably. No rush for alienated
industrialization.
Today we are
willing to fight in all forums, national and international for our culture which
is part of our world view, our culture and heritage. Both of enormous wealth,
despite the appearance of sobriety they have. We want, as we have said
elsewhere, to make visible that under the simple is often the greatest wealth,
and on the edge of this country and planet our people survive a claiming for dignity
and recognition.
