U'wa Communique | Amazon Watch
Amazon Watch

U’wa Communique

July 1, 2003 | For Immediate Release


U'wa Traditional Authority

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Cubara, Colombia –

The U’wa People, Children of God, Children of our Mother Earth, Lovers of the Natural World and of the Spirits

The U’wa people are tired of the proliferation of false promises that the Colombian government has made to us. We, the U’wa, are the guardians of this, our ancestral territory of thousands of years, and each day, the government and corporations are violating our sacred territory.

According to the State, indigenous people are the minority, but we, the U’wa, say that we are only a minority in the white society; in reality, we are the majority, because we know and live with Nature. Because of this, the father and mother of the sky, and all of the spirits of nature, care for and protect our struggle to defend the natural world, even if it means that we lay down our own lives.

It is for this reason that the U’wa have one Law only, unchanging and inviolable; the Law that was given to us by the creator, which is unwritten and yet woven into our cultural practices: to protect Nature, to love her, to care for her, and to use her gifts well. But the government follows other laws, and the laws that they have made are changeable and breakable, so that frequently they will do away with those laws they do not favor. This is why Colombia is a country wherein so many laws fail; laws are violated, and written by a minority for everyone to follow, while the Law of the U’wa passes from one generation to the next, unaltered.

As the government has invented its Law, they therefore say that the riches of the ground and beneath the ground belong to the State; and now, we ask, “Who made the Earth and its riches, the water, the plants, mountains, the sun, the moon, the stars? Who made man himself? Where are the tools that they use to destroy nature taken from? This is to say, where do men get the materials that they use to age the world and bring destruction to it? Moreover, we want them to demonstrate for us that their laws and codes are capable of creating anything like the earth that we live in; if they cannot, then they have no claim to ownership of the Earth and its riches. This is why we require that the Government and the industries respect the sacred ancestral territory. And not only should they give respect to our ancestral grounds and to those titles given to the U’wa under colonialism, they should see that the U’wa also constitute a State, with our own laws and codes to manage and protect nature. We will continue defending our ancestral territory, though we have already been victims of kidnapping, torture and death. We have lost a boy and three indigenous rights advocates from North America (Ingrid Washinawatok, Lahena’e Gay, and Terence Freitas) who came to support the U’wa cause. How long will it be until we are left in peace? Or will they drive to extinction the entire U’wa people, so that they can take all of the resources in our sacred ancestral territory?

If the company takes all of the resources of our Mother Earth, where are they going to get the materials they need to exploit the riches of the ground and the substrate? What will happen? And where are we going to live? Under the earth, in the air, in the sky? When nature and the creator of this world and those forces beyond it send their punishment for the disrespect of the natural world, their punishment will not be communicated to anyone; no one will know the day and hour of the destruction of the Earth.

If the government and the company think that money is God, as well as progress and development, then the god of money will save their lives while the U’wa will die in the defense of nature; therefore, the U’wa will not go to toil for industry. We are born to die or to live, and no single human being may save himself, or defy the rule of God, or of Nature. Perhaps if the company and the government have faith in their Money God, and if he really exists, he will save them, making another world for them to destroy; if he does not, they will all die.

Historically, the territory of Indigenous Peoples was ample, limitless; we were free to go to any part of the indigenous territory in the Americas, from North America to Chile, and beyond. We did this without private interest; we traveled to exchange gifts, and to learn each other’s customs.

But when the Spanish invaders arrived, they changed all of this, and now we live on tiny, limited parcels of land. Currently, they are trying to put an end to our culture through their invasions: through the Church, industry, and the government, as well as those who compete to strip our sacred territory in order to get petroleum and the other resources above and beneath the ground. We the U’wa demand that the government, oil companies, colonists, and armed groups respect our sacred territory, and that white society’s abuse of our daughters, mothers, and wives is halted— we want no more of the Mestiziation which is the result of the Spanish invasion and the rape of our women. We ask you whites: are you not yourselves descended from indigenous ancestors? You are. Therefore help us to protect our culture and cease the abuse of this planet, which is home to us all. Before the arrival of the Spanish, white people did not exist on this continent; oceans separated this from the white world. Thanks to the Spanish, there are now white people here, and thanks to those indigenous people you coupled with, there are Mestizos who you now refuse to recognize. Why won’t you leave our Ancestral Territory and the lands that you occupy – which is property of indigenous peoples – in PEACE? The whites who do not understand us abuse indigenous women more and more each day. Therefore we demand that the government punish whites that abuse indigenous people. This is why the government makes laws, and if this law isn’t complied with, what good are laws?

We want ECOPETROL to leave our territory, since its presence is a form of the violation of our culture. Oil is not development. Instead, it brings war, hunger, poverty, death and destruction. The government says that oil brings “progress and development”, but we the U’wa do not want our territory to become another IRAQ, and we know that oil brings progress only to a few rich and established capitalists. We don’t know where the money derived from resources goes. It only benefits a few individuals and families.

If you do not listen to us, if you regard us only with rage, or hatred, or grudging, we the U’wa are prepared to lay down our lives when the day of invasion comes. We will die defending our territory when you send your troops to kill all of the U’was, because we are tired of receiving, from the companies and the government, so many threats to destroy our territory, its resources, and our culture.

We the U’wa have faith in God, faith in our Mother Earth, faith in the Gods of Nature, faith in the spirits of Nature, and thus we know that they will revenge the destruction of this world. We know which is the owner of this world, between you or God. And if the Earth really is the State’s, then they should control the furies of Nature, because for God, nothing is impossible.

If an U’wa disagrees with cultural principles, he is not U’wa, he isn’t anything.

THE INDIGENOUS U’WA PEOPLE

“Cultures with principles have no price”

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