These are excerpts from an interview conducted in November 2009 by members of ACOGUATE. Miguel Fernando Solis is executive coordinator and editor of The Observer and research association in the political, economic and social at the University of San Carlos de Guatemala (USAC). Javier de León is a Mam Mayan community leader, defender of the rights of indigenous peoples and coordinator of the Association for Comprehensive Development Ixtahuacán (ADISMI).
ACOGUATE: In the context of armed conflict after what has been the role of mining in Guatemala?
FS: The formal end of the war was the imposition of a state model. When I speak of the state, do not speak of institutions as such but a form of power relations that will create conditions for Guatemala to be linked and are accepted into the comity of democratic nations. Guatemala was considered a non-democratic country because it had military governments. Formally, we are a democracy and in peace. However, it is not true. At home, remain the same conditions that gave rise to conflict. Justice never worked for questioning who had been human rights violators and enforcers of counterinsurgency. The military is living there, and people of money that financed the war was never prosecuted.
This state was built after the signing of peace promotes the articulation of the country into global capitalism, globalized. The only thing that was created conditions that legally, or in the formal context of a liberal capitalist democracy, companies come and generate a series of linkages to exploit the resources. Now is a logic of expansion and taking of territory (as in the time of colonization), and also under a key, which is the ideological subjugation, or win the minds of people. That is a form of violence.
ACOGUATE: How can we say that there are two opposing visions of development with regard to mining in Guatemala?
JDL: When the mining industry came, we started to compare the development model that we have the First Nations and the model imposed by capitalism. They are totally contradictory. The basement or ground, to the indigenous people, has a name. For example, Mam says Knan Chojch. Knan means "our mother" and Chojch is ground, for our mother earth. Cultural element that breaks with the arrival of a crime for which there is Mother Earth. For a crime, the land is land and therefore have to extract resources. The cultural connotations are broken and hence why the conflict generated and therefore are not compatible.
FS: For extractive industries, the development comes from the collection of revenue and profits. The idea is that the land, resources, water, forest, mountain, volcano are goods that can be extracted and sold. The indigenous peoples development is mainly the reproduction of life in full conditions. The problem is not that the mining company paid more for what they removed, but the problem is removed, and the value at which it sells those resources abroad. Some propose the mine to pay 5 or 10% of royalties. Although pay 100% of what it extracts the fundamental problem is that extract nonrenewable resources, impacting not only the environment but also the livelihoods of populations.
ACOGUATE: What are the mechanisms of resistance that are taking place in communities and what legal instruments underlying the claims?
JDL: In Guatemala, particularly in the case of San Marcos, communities and Sipakapense Mam, practices of resistance and community organizations rely on community authorities. Community authorities are or traditional authorities who have made the role of communication, education, guidance and organization to the community consensus to see if they agree or disagree with the issue of natural resource extraction. Hence arises what is technically called community consultations. They are one of the mechanisms of resistance that has been made in defending the territory. This democratic process is being practiced for centuries in communities where they meet, talk, reach consensus, they write the agreement through an official report. This is linked to the issue of the rights established in international and national legal instruments. In the Constitution of the Republic, Article 66 provides that the people have the right to decide the lifestyle they want, even the form of social organization. Moreover, the municipal code states that communities should be consulted or traditional authorities, in this case the community mayors. All this is also supported by international instruments such as Convention 169 of the International Labour Organization (ILO) in Articles 6, 7, 8 and 15.
Although the State or the Constitutional Court said that consultations are not binding, however, are binding because it is a legitimate and legal practice engaged communities. A report of the National Commission on transparency of Congress who said that despite being made many years after the consultations, no longer a legitimate right of communities because it is legally established.
ACOGUATE: What difficulties have faced organizations and community representatives in their rejection of mining?
FS: A fundamental problem is the denial by the state of the system tools it gives communities to defend these rights, such as Convention 169. The first question: what form to use if the state itself refuses instruments legal? Convention 169, the fundamental principle is that communities are entitled to free, prior and informed. That has not occurred in any of the cases. The second problem
striking is the criminalization of the struggle, through the use by the State security forces to deal with social protest. A mobilization is answered by the police and the army. Then, mechanisms that have been practiced during the time of war: violent harassment, extrajudicial killings, disappearance, direct attack. So what are the forms that are to enforce the rights in this context? Can not go to court, because the same court are subordinate to private interests. Here, the whole scaffolding of justice operates on the basis of bribery and attention to interests rather than collective. He who pays. He who has the ticket to pay a court official has assured the process unscathed.
ACOGUATE: What are the weaknesses of the social movement as the theme of the defense of natural resources and what are the challenges of communities?
JDL: One is the political division between the leadership. One of the elements of the strategy is not to articulate community movements into one. On the other hand comes the issue of poverty and extreme poverty. People do not have much time to be thinking about what to do in the movement to defend its territory, but rather is thinking what is going to eat today. Then there is the political question of the political parties, far from articulating a community force to address the collective problems, fragmented community unity. The leadership struggle is a fatal problem in Guatemala, which explains why we could not win a majority government when we, the Maya people in Guatemala.
FS: There must be clear that in mining, there is a power up which is very strong historically. Is the power of corporations, transnational corporations and groups of power that goes centuries. You have to understand that to deal with that power, we must also build a new one. Now, the constitution of this power does not pass or by the political party or government, because power is faced with power. This involves building political projects and I am not referring here to a partisan project. The national bourgeoisie, families corporate groups are very clear in their political and economic projects. Is the profit. The communities are clear that they do not want this project and they want another form of development. We must build a power that is able to endure, to say the multinationals that do not want that. ...................................
For ACOGUATE
1. According to the Mining Act of Guatemala, in force since January 1998 is, you must pay 1% of the royalties for mining (0.5% to 0.5% State and the municipality). [Article 63, Mining Act and Regulations, Ministry of Energy and Mining, Mining Department, Guatemala, Decree 48-97]. http://www.mem.gob.gt/Portal/MEMDocuments/DGM/Ley/ley% 20of% 20the% 20mineria% 20SU% 20reglamento.pdf
2. "Article 6.1 In applying the provisions of this Convention, governments shall: a) consult the peoples concerned, through appropriate procedures and in particular through their representative institutions, each time it is given to legislative or administrative measures which directly affect them [...]. " http://www.ilo.org/public/spanish/region/ampro/lima/publ/conv-169/convenio.shtml
3. Decision of the Constitutional Court of Guatemala on May 8, 2007 in which he described as legitimate legal and consulting Sipakapa of June 18, 2005, but not binding. (File 1179 to 2005).
4. Report and Verification Research Authorization Process operating licenses in the municipalities of San Juan Sacatepequez, Department of Guatemala and San Miguel community, San Marcos Department, National Special Commission for Transparency, October 23, 2009.
http://www.congreso.gob.gt/uploadimg/documentos/n9132.pdf 
