Piatsaw: The Resistance of the Native Peoples of Ecuadorian Amazon against extractivism.

For decades, the indigenous peoples of the Ecuadorian Amazon (Kichwa, Shuar, Kofán, Sapára...) have risen up in resistance against the government's numerous concessions to domestic companies and foreign multinationals for extractive activities. Their resistance has been crucial to protect their lands from the devastating environmental impact caused by the extraction of oil and metal ores or to block the implementation of hidroelectric projects that threaten the balance of their territory. The environmental disaster caused by Texaco's activities, considered the worst oil disaster in history, has prompted communities to persevere in their resistance, successfully blocking numerous concessions and safeguarding their natural and cultural heritage. (*Piatsaw was the first man, and God of Sápara mythology who prophesied the end of his people).

A decade ago, a group of Amazonian villagers won a historic legal victory against one of the most powerful corporations in the world: Chevron. In 1964, Texaco (now Chevron), arrived in Ecuador with a concession of 1.5 million hectares in the provinces of Sucumbíos and Orellana. When the company arrived, the only inhabitants of the region were the ancestral indigenous communities in the jungle. The oil giant admitted in court to having dumped 19 billion gallons of crude oil and harmful chemicals directly into unlined rivers and pools in a particularly biodiverse region of the Ecuadorian rainforest over decades. This operation constituted one of the largest oil- related environmental disasters the world has ever seen. The company contaminated an area of some 4,000 square kilometers, threatening the lives and livelihoods of numerous indigenous communities, small farmers and countless species of flora and fauna. According to the company, there was no human presence in the area where they worked, thus disqualifying the presence of indigenous people.
The inhabitants of the region suffered the consequences of extraction, their health and future were affected by contaminants present in the soil and groundwater, quantities exceeding permissible levels in Ecuador. To this day the inhabitants remain living in the vicinity of the concession area where hundreds of waste ponds leach toxins into the waters that travel wherever the rains go, carrying heavy metals such as mercury, cadmium, petroleum hydrocarbons, that cause serious health complications.
Following the events that indelibly marked the future of many families, the native peoples of the Ecuadorian Amazon, threatened by the continuous concessions to companies for extractive activities, applied different defense methodologies against mining, oil companies and the Government. The struggles against the entry of oil and mining companies in indigenous territories, such as territorial surveillance, armed confrontations, National strikes and their presence in the courts, were the strategies that the indigenous nationalities used to stop the loss and destruction of their territories.

The indigenous people are the guardians of the forest. No one like them can better preserve and defend it. People always defend something that they know, that they value and that is necessary, and the natives are completely dependent on nature for their survival. I think this is the main reason why indigenous people are the best defenders of nature. They live in some of the most biodiverse territories, in close relationship with everything that inhabits it, and they live with a sense of interconnectedness with all things, including spirits who interact with them in dreams and in their perceptions.