by JENNIFER MOORE
“On January 28th 1995, when the cry went out that Peruvian troops had attacked the Ecuadorian border, the whole country went into motion with one heart. Now, when the Amazonian peoples cry out that multinational corporations have invaded our territory, the rest of the country is indifferent, apathetic, having declared a cold war…” – Father Juan de la Cruz, following protests in late September, written October 2009
Father Juan de la Cruz is a Salesiano priest who has worked among the Shuar indigenous people in Ecuador’s southern Amazon for the last twenty three years. Born in the area, De la Cruz accompanied the Shuar when they fought for Ecuador against Peru in a border war in the 1990s. Today, he says he “cannot remain silent” as they fight against oil and mining multinationals that would threaten the health of their natural environment and which has strained relations between the Shuar and the government of President Rafael Correa.
De la Cruz calls a recent decision by Ecuador’s Communications Commission to revoke a Shuar radio station’s frequency “a grave error” and an effort to undermine their struggle against oil and mining interests. He says the radio ‘Voice of Arutam’ is the only station in the area “where you can talk about the potential impacts of multinational companies and the plunder of our territories.”
On December 17th 2009, the National Communications Commission (CONATEL) emitted a resolution deciding to cancel the contract for the frequency belonging to the ‘Voice of Arutam’ station. Broadcasting from the town of Sucua in the southern Amazonian province of Morona Santiago where the Interprovincial Shuar Federation (FISCH) has their office, they first began broadcasting in 1972 with support from Salesiano priests and with a focus on bilingual education. The FISCH represents about 120,000 Shuar in the southern Amazon. Arutam is the name of their spiritual guide.
CONATEL based its decision on statements broadcast live during interviews with Shuar leaders in the context of mobilizations which took place late last September. According to CONATEL, remarks broadcast on Radio Arutam incited the Shuar people to violence and contravened an article in the Radio and Television Law which prohibits “the promotion of physical or psychological violence using children, women, youth or elderly people, or that provides incentive for, carries out or motivates racism, sale of sex, pornography, consumption of drugs, religious or political intolerance and other analogous acts that affect the dignity of human beings.”
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