20,000 people marched through the streets of Cusco last week to protest a new law enabling private enterprises to take over the management of archaeological sites in Peru.
Thousands of tourists were left stranded as PeruRail closed the railway to Macchu Picchu “as a security measure”. Tourists arriving in Cusco by bus had to walk from blockades in the suburbs.
“We are not asking for the law to be modified, we want it repealed” said General Secretary of the Cusco Workers Federation Wilfredo Alvarez.
For government supporters, the law was an attempt to attract outside funding to protect Peru’s heritage. There are hundreds of archaeological sites throughout Peru with no protection other than a blue concrete block announcing that they are Protected National Heritage. Thousands more are unrecognised.
The Minister of Culture in Lima emphasised that the decree did not apply to World Heritage sites such as Macchu Pichu and the historic centre of Cusco city.
In the face of the protest, an extraordinary session of the Cultural Committee of Congress was scheduled for the morning of Thursday, the second day of protest, to discuss whether the region of Cusco might be exempted from the Law. It rapidly passed a recommendation that Congress give such an exemption.
And on the third day, Friday 22 October, the full Parliament voted by a large majority to not only exempt the Cusco region but to repeal the law.
Popular demonstrations in Peru rarely achieve such a rapid response. Las Bambas is a massive mining project just 72 km South West of Cusco, but hours away from any tourist routes. It is claimed the development, with an investment of 10 billion US dollars, will increase national income by 1.4%.
The project has been five years in development and includes a multi-million dollar social fund, and a new town with modern housing, school, health centre and sports stadium for re-settled communities, some of the poorest in the country.
Relations between the communities and the mine company were good. Things changed when the project was sold to a new owner. It had been previously agreed that mineral ores would be sent 140 km through a closed underground slurry pipeline to an existing processing plant. MMG decided instead to build new processing plants nearby and use 125 lorries daily to transport 50 tonnes of ores to the plant.
The communities and institutions had been consulted on and approved the original Environmental Impact Study. The change was communicated to the government via two unpublished “Technical Supporting Notes” without public consultation.
It was an administrative decision” Explained Vice President of MMG Domingo Drago, whilst ex-Vice Minister for Mines Pedro Gamio admitted it was a mistake.
In the aftermath of protests in September 2015, where three people were shot dead by police, Prime Minister Pedro Cateriana emphasised that the project would go ahead. The 1750 police and 155 army soldiers in the area would be expanded with a further 250 police and 200 soldiers.“We emphatically condemn the use of violence” he said, referring to the protesters, and asked that judges “apply the full weight of the law against anyone who seeks to create violence”.
A third example illustrates how tourism and local protests can become messily intertwined. Thirty tourists were detained by several hundred local protestors in the Manu National Park, a UNESCO world heritage site in one of the most biodiverse regions of the world. The tourists were released unharmed soon afterwards, but the incident hit the national newspaper headlines.
The protestors were not complaining about damage to their pristine forests, but demanding the construction of a road to connect Nueva Eden and Puerto Shipeteari in the Manu province of Madre de Dios.
In November, Sernanp (National State Service for Natural Protected Areas) the organisation for the protection of the National Parks, insisted that the building of this and another road must end. “They have constructed illegal roads. Any infrastructure in this buffer zone must have our approval that it complies with environmental standards,” said the head of Sernanp.
Regional Governor Luis Otsuka, former President of the Miners Federation of Madre de Dios, said the road was just giving access to poor and isolated communities. Sernanp said the roads were being used for the transport of heavy machinery, chemicals and fuel to support illegal mining and logging in the region.
There are an estimated 20,000 illegal miners working in the Madre de Dios region, according to Sernanp. They have cut down 50,000 hectares of forest and contaminated land and rivers with mercury.
By the end of November, the Governor of Madre de Dios had launched an indefinite regional strike of drivers, farmers and miners calling for the repeal of two laws addressing illegal mining and illegal logging.”The time has come for us to fight together” he told the press. This is a fight tourists would do well to avoid.