Ixil Maya Resistance against Megaprojects in Cotzal, Guatemala

Abstract

Ixil Maya Resistance against Megaprojects in Cotzal, Guatemala Giovanni Batz (bio) Due to an increasing global demand for natural resources coupled with neoliberalization, there has been a significant growth in infrastructure and extractive industries which have negatively affected indigenous communities.1 These demands for electricity and metals are often to the benefit of foreigners living in developed nations and people living outside of the affected communities. However, the cost of covering such demands has also meant displacement and conflict for those living near these projects. Since the end of the Guatemalan Civil War (1960–1996), the Ixil region (consisting of the municipalities of Chajul, Cotzal and Nebaj), has witnessed the arrival of international corporations that have constructed (or are in the process of obtaining licenses to build) megaprojects such as mines or hydroelectric dams. By May 2018, the Ixil region had two operational hydroelectric projects (the Hidro Xacbal Dam in Chajul and the Palo Viejo hydroelectric plant in Cotzal), another under construction (the Xacbal Delta Dam in Chajul), and three amparos (legal protection for constitutional individual or community rights) involving hydroelectric dams (all in Nebaj). An amparo in these cases has prevented companies from building their projects until the legal matter of consultation has been resolved by the judicial system. Furthermore, a mining project to extract barite (a mineral used in fracking) in Salquil Grande, Nebaj has also generated tensions and potential conflicts.2 Despite the discourses of development associated with these megaprojects, they have produced little or no benefits to surrounding communities where they operate. Instead, these projects have generated community conflicts, social divisions, evictions, arrest warrants for community leaders, and environmental degradation, as well as remilitarization through the establishment of army garrisons and states of siege. In Cotzal, the arrival of these foreign companies and megaprojects was referred to as the "new invasion" or "fourth invasion" after the first, second and third invasions of Spanish colonization, the creation of the plantation economy between the 1870s and 1930s, and the Guatemalan Civil War, respectively.3 This article examines a movement in Cotzal against the construction of the Palo Viejo hydroelectric plant built by the Italian company Enel on the finca (plantation) San Francisco from 2008–2012.4 Palo Viejo includes four [End Page 1016] separate concrete diversion dams (Presa Cotzal, Presa Chipal, Presa El Desengaño, and Presa El Regadío), and a reservoir.5 The struggle was characterized by peaceful resistance, a four-month blockade, and the arrival of the military, as well as the creation and breakdown of a roundtable dialogue between the company and local communities. The Ixil region has a history of foreign intervention and extraction, externally-imposed forms of development, state-sponsored violence and resistance. During a dialogue meeting between Enel and the communities of Cotzal, an Ixil leader recognized these cyclical forms of invasion, drawing parallels between Enel's arrival and the Spanish invasion: There is no recognition here of Indigenous Peoples, because you [Enel] come like the god, you act like the god among our communities, because you are the ones who will give gifts… 500 years ago you came with a mirror… Now you want to give away other things… You always want to be above the Indigenous; if you have your say, the Indigenous have to accept what comes from above, that's racism… That's how I feel it, because I'm Indigenous and I feel it that way… You continue to view us like you are used to seeing us, as indios.6 The Alcalde Indígena of Cotzal, Concepcion Santay Gomez, equates the arrival of the Brol family—who displaced the Ixil over a century ago to create the finca San Francisco—with the arrival of Enel: "the arrival of the Brols is equal to the arrival of Enel now, they arrived offering things to our people. Our grandfathers and grandmothers had to leave their lands back then, [now Enel is] constructing the dam on the land where they used to be."7 I argue that the arrival of megaprojects, such as Palo Viejo, continues the history of a colonial logic of extraction, and is an extension of the historical tensions between the communities of Cotzal, the...