Four months ago when several Maya rights organizations accused the Briceno Government of attempting to impose its will on the Mayas of Toledo, who continue to fight for the full implementation of Maya community land rights.
Since 2015, the Caribbean Court of Justice has played the dutiful role of referee between the government and the representatives of the Maya communities. The judges continue to provide oversight on how best to translate Maya Communal Land Rights from the principles of court judgment into an actual land ownership system that is recognized and respected by the Ministry of Natural Resources.
The implementation process is now in its 7th year. The next stage in implementation was finalizing a Free Prior Informed Consent Protocol (FPIC). As we told you, the FPIC is basically the rule book that the two sides must agree on. It will govern all future interactions between GOB and the Maya when it comes to entering- and exploiting the natural resources on - what will eventually be recognized as Maya communal lands.
In late January, the Maya Leaders Alliance, the Toledo Alcaldes Association, and the Julian Cho Society accused the government of ambushing the Maya people with their FPIC document, which was presented to the CCJ — without the buy-in of these representatives of the Maya communities.
That was their first major complaint. The next was the interchangeable use of the words "consent," which they insist the 2015 CCJ judgment mandates, and "consultation," a lower threshold of responsibility on the government. In fact, the protocol document's name has changed from Free Prior Informed Consent to Free Prior Informed Consultation.
The Commissioner of Indigenous Peoples Affairs has strongly resisted that as a mischaracterization of their protocol which conforms to the standards of international law and empowers the Maya communities with a robust right to disagree with any proposed administrative decision from any government.
The discord between the two sides continued to build from that point up until today, when the CCJ hosted its most recent compliance hearing. This was the first opportunity for the court to discuss the FPIC document, get feedback and listen to the opinions of 2 experts. For today's opening discussion, however, the Mayan litigants chose to focus on what they say is an unceasing campaign by GOB to dilute the strength of the Maya representatives by introducing other Maya rights NGOs into the implementation process.
As viewers are aware, the two sides cannot agree on who actually represents the best interest of the Maya. They're both accusing each other of attempting to monopolize that representation. Here is an excerpt of the bitter complaints from the Maya Leaders Alliance and the Toledo Alcaldes Association, which was presented by their attorney Leslie Mendez:
Leslie Mendez - Attorney for MLA/TAA
"Ever since, we noticed that when there was a change of administration, we noticed that there was an increased interest in the internal affairs of the Maya people. We brought this repeatedly to the attention of the courts because we did consider that this was threatening the sustainability and stability of this process. We saw that the commissioner and the ministry were exhibiting an insistence on choosing who the legitimate representatives of the Maya people were. Once again, for us, and the experts agree - that it is not for the government to act as an arbiter of legitimacy among the communities as to who their representatives are. It is not for the government to decide who the winners and losers are among the communities. And we say that this is, in fact, what is happening. We have highlighted in our response one of what we think is a glaring deficiency in the opinion provided by Dr. Figueroa because we say that even though she does accept the position that the government has no place in choosing the representatives, your Honors, the impact of her position is one that leaves the door wide open for the government to, in fact, do just that. In her opinion, she assumes the legitimacy of all of these represents the institutions of all of these other organizations. We say that we have been here for seven years now, for seven years. The respondents have been well aware, as we're speaking with, and despite the fact that specific parties entered into this consent order, despite the fact that it is only one institution that is made up of the collective of the duly elected leader among the communities. This election is rooted also in their customary process, Your Honors. What we are seeing now, seven years later, is an attempt to completely unsettle the representation of the Maya people and, by extension, unsettle this particular process and upend this particular process. All that we are asking is for the court and, with the help of the experts, is to simply tell the government to stop, to focus on what they have to do, and let the representation of the Maya people be dealt with by the Maya people. They cannot be throwing their weight around when it comes to my representation. Furthermore, I just want to lastly say that this is a consent order. The parties entered into a settlement, and it cannot be possible that the appellants would have entered into a consent order, would have entered into a settlement thinking or assuming or accepting that after entering through that settlement order, the government would be allowed to bring in nonfunctional organizations into the process and be imposing them on the other side."
