'Our land is not for sale': Ecuador's Waorani rally to defend Amazon from government oil plans
Dozens of the Waorani Indigenous community gathered in Ecuador’s capital on Wednesday, May 14, to protest government proposals to expand oil exploitation in the Amazon region.
Dressed in traditional attire and carrying spears, the demonstrators voiced their opposition to new extractive initiatives that they say threaten their ancestral lands and way of life.
The protest was held in anticipation of a Constitutional Court ruling that could impact Indigenous land rights and environmental protections.
“We are concerned that the Court will issue a regressive ruling on rights, that the Court will use the Guarani case to facilitate the Executive's extractive agenda, that the Court will continue to say that there are peoples and territories that can be sacrificed. The Guarani territory is not for sale, ladies and gentlemen of the Court, President Noboa, Guarani life is to be respected, it is not expendable,” one protester said.
Another participant recounted the environmental damage caused by previous oil operations: “In my community, an oil mine came to exploit it. It cut down many trees, and the birds died,” the demonstrator told AFP.
Protesters also expressed concern over the government's consultation process with Indigenous communities, citing a lack of clarity and cultural understanding.
“With the consultation. We don't know what a consultation means to us. We don't know what an oil tender is. We don't know what a bunch of terms are. No. So, to understand, the only thing we ask is that the consultation be done on the territory and that they understand that it's the term of interculturality so we can understand each other as well,” said another protestor.
In 2019, the Waorani secured a legal victory that blocked oil companies from operating on 180,000 hectares of their territory, located within the Amazonian provinces of Pastaza, Napo, and Orellana. While the ruling recognised the Waorani's rights to their land, it upheld state authority over the subsoil and its resources.
