The Executive Committee of the Amerindian Peoples Association (APA) recently met in Georgetown for one of its statutory meetings during which the Committee held discussions on several issues of relevance to Amerindians in Guyana. One of these issues was the Beal Aerospace Project.

Reports from representatives coming out of the Mabaruma and the Moruka Sub-Regions in the Barima/Waini, Region 1, reveal that there are serious areas for concerns by communities that stand to bear the impact of this project.

Santa Rosa is the largest Amerindian community in the Moruka Sub-Region and whilst this is not the village closest to the proposed Beal location, it is most highly populated and the community depend heavily on the area within the proposed site for most of its resources. Other smaller communities including Assakata, Kwebanna, Barama Mouth (Kanubali) and Warapoka and even Waramuri further down from Santa Rosa also utalise the resources in the area. This applies to the area from Luri on the Waini, through the Baramani, Bara Bara and the Muruca River as far as Manawarin. There are also three lagoons in the proposed site of the Beal project. There is a school at the first and third lagoons and another at the mouth of the Waini. These schools were all built because of the settlements in the area.

These communities collect troolie to thatch their houses from the area. They also hunt and fish, get house materials such as round posts, fell trees for canoes and cut muckru for baskets, crab quakes and for sewing thatch, to name a few things, from there. In the case of Santa Rosa, it is difficult to get these materials close to the community as the population is large and most of these resources cannot be found close to the community’s land. Waramuri, even further away, also collect troolie from there.

From the Mabaruma Sub-Region, Hobo, a small community close to the Mabaruma airstrip, also go in the area to hunt, fish and catch crab. People from Hotoquai, Koriabo and the lower Aruka hunt, fish and collect raw materials in the areas as well. Other families settled along the Barima River, and non-Amerindians, including peoplefrom the Pamaroon fish and catch crab in the area.

Residents in some of these communities are now questioning the way the discussions for the deal is going ahead and are concerned with access and other rights, including their land rights. Beal officials, at a meeting with residents of Santa Rosa, had assured them that the representatives were only there to gather information and that they would return to the community before the signing of any agreement with the government. at that time some residents of that community said that they were not opposed to the Beal project but neither were they in agreement with it as they said that they required more information before they could make a decision. The company haad told them that an environmental Impact Assessment would be done in relation to the project. At the time, when questioned about the access to the area in the five-mile buffer zone that was the area then under discussion, the Beal representatives could not say what this would be.

There is now concern in the communities that that since this meeting, there have been changes in the information provided to the communities in relation to the deal but neither has the company nor the government returned to the communities. A far as some has found out from the newspapers that infrequently reach them, discussions are now being carried out concerning an area larger than the five mile buffer zone previously mentioned, and the land is up for sale and not for lease as they had been made to understand. They are worried that no one seems to be considering the rights of the people to the land and its resources. Some are questioning a line of thought that seems to be saying that as long as the turtles are safe, we can go ahead with the project. they a4re saying that this is however a smaller issue as compared to the rights of that depend on the land and its resources for survival.

The APA feels strongly that the government is wrong in taking the top down approach to this issue. As has happened in the past, it appears that once the final decision is made then the communities will be informed of what the deal is and then they will be left to cope with the consequences of whatever agreement is foisted upon them. As has been the norm in these cases, the communities right to information and to participate in decisions that may affect their lives are not considered.

The Executive Committee of the organisation had requested a meeting with President Bharrat Jagdeo to discuss a number of issues, including this one, but there was no positive response forthcoming in regard to this request.

Executive Committee
Amerindian Peoples Association
December 2, 1999