Radio Mundo Real

The jury of the "Dams, peoples rights and impunity" pre-hearing of the Environmental devastation and peoples rights Table at the Permanent Peoples Tribunal (PPT) – Mexico concluded in the past days.

The Table worked at the beginning of November, 2012, in Temacapulin, Jalisco State, Mexico, a community that together with Acasijo and Palmarejo is threatened by the building of El Zapotillo Dam, on Verde River.

The decision of the pre-hearing highlights that there are 4200 dams in Mexico and there are projects to build 30 more by 2017.

The building of these works has brought a pattern of serious and systematic human rights violations, violating in addition the rights of the peoples and communities, among others: the forced displacement of over 185 thousand people that becomes a violation to the right to housing, violations to the right of information and participation, the right to consultation and free, prior and informed consent of the indigenous peoples, the right to the self-determination of the peoples, to water, to food and when there are processes organized to resist the building of dams, the criminalization of the social protest.

Peoples, communities and organizations affected by Cerro de Oro, paso de la Reyna y Ampliacion Cerro de Oro (Oaxaca), La Parota (Guerrero), Las Cruces y El Cajón (Nayarit), El Naranjal y Zongolica (Veracruz), Arcediano and El Zapotillo (Jalisco) and La Yesca (Nayarit-Jalisco) were heard in Temacapulin.

The decision by the jury made up by seven national and international experts will be part of the documents submitted to the PPT´s environmental Table in 2013 and at the final hearing of the tribunal in 2014.

It will also be submitted to all authorities involved in the development of the dam projects, considering that they are the addressees of the recommendations included in the document.

The member of MAPDER and Real World Radio´s collaborator, Monica Montalvo, interviewed Daniel Vazquez, who was part of the jury that received the testimonies, evidence and deliberated during the sessions in Temacapulin.

Daniel is a professor at the Latin American Social Sciences School (FLACSO) - Mexico.