Most ads are interactive -- click on them to visit the folks who make The Panama News possible

opinion

Also in this section:
Bernal, the "MAMIocracy"
Leis, Panama's indigenous comarcas
What they're saying about the Iraq War and the protests against it
Cooper, The United States vs. reporters in Iraq
Armington & Birns, Roger Noriega's sorry Latin American policy legacy
Gutman, Grooming politicians for Satan
Silié, From the Cold War to the War on Terror
Avneri, Likudnik gladiators
Stimson, China's new leader isn't the right man
Sliwa, Freeing Africa's child soldiers
Jackson, Putting campus radicals to the test
Lettieri & Birns, University of Panama's mess gets worse

What are the comarcas for?

by Raúl Leis R. --- raulleisr@hotmail.com

Are the indigenous comarcas the cause of the poverty that afflicts their populations? It isn’t so --- poverty predates the existence of the comarcas, whose origins are found in the marginalization and discrimination to which the indigenous peoples have been subjected.

Some 20 percent of Panamanian territory is occupied by these comarcas and the fact that the majority of indigenous people have their lands legalized must be recognized as an important accomplishment, the deliverance of an historic right. However, parts of these communities are outside the comarcas, on lands that have not been legalized, while others are found in protected areas and, increasingly, occupying urban and semi-urban areas.

The claims of the indigenous movements have always been very closely linked to territory, but added to that are demands in defense of languages, cultures and habitat. The indigenous movements struggle with various challenges. For them, the legalization and protection of their territories, the preservation of their communities and ways of organization and production, full access to the rights of citizenship, the maintenance of their languages, customs and beliefs are fundamental aims, in addition to the necessity to structure the Panamanian state as multiethnic and multinational in which people may express themselves in the government with defined rights.

The comarca “is an indigenous land with semi-autonomous political organization under the jurisdiction of the national government. Although it is at the same time a geo-political division and an administrative system with geographic limits and internal regulations, it isn’t independent of the state. It is more a matter of the state recognizing the unique characteristics of indigenous society in contrast to that of the rest of the nation, and both governments --- national and indigenous --- reach general agreements. The indigenous peoples accommodate themselves to certain state interests like sovereignty, security and the exploitation of resources, in order to get their own land. They make the majority of decisions about cultural, economic and political matters that affect their populations. Within the limits of their geo-political and administrative region, indigenous people by and large govern themselves under their own political system, while always maintaining allegiance to the state” (Herlihy, 1995). The comarca has its foundation in the ethnic and territorial roots of a people, and supposes the maintenance of the community’s own characteristics, which flow from its history and identity. It’s a concept very different from that of a reservation, which means marginalization and apartheid.

The first comarca has its origin in 1925, when the Kunas rose up in an insurrection that attempted to break their ties with the Panamanian state, as a response to internal colonialism expressed by a policy of forced integration. After this conflict the government of Panama recognized a reservation by way of law 59 of 1930, by later, with Law 2 of 1938, the Kunas were given their present territory under the name of the San Blas Comarca, which is now the Kuna Yala Comarca. Later other indigenous peoples demanded the legalization of their territories, and as a model of organization --- although modifying it --- the comarca.

As the anthropologist Gilberto López y Rivas said, “The obstacles for the consolidation of autonomy are militarism and the doctrine of national security, exclusion and racism, conditions of extreme poverty, and structural adjustment plans and neo-liberal proposals that seek to appropriate the natural resources of indigenous peoples. The territorial autonomy of these peoples is an indispensable condition for the intelligent and sustainable management of biodiversity.”

Not all the indigenous population is within the comarcas. Some, like the Naso, Bri Bri and Bokota, don’t have their own comarcas and many others who belong to groups that do have them don’t live within them. Thus half of the Kunas live outside their comarcas. The majority of Embera and Wounaan, as the result of their great dispersal, are outside of theirs, and demand the legalization of what are designated as collective lands. Migration caused by marginalization and abandonment provokes 47 percent of indigenous people to live outside these autonomous territories/

Studies demonstrate that the indigenous people who live outside the comarcas are --- relatively --- better off than those inside them. The explanation is simple: the comarcas are given fewer resources and investments, which prompts the migration.

The comarcas are a space that represents a great resource for development, starting from the challenge of being able to structure and carry out plans for human development within the comarcas, where synergistic factors can be articulated to raise the quality of life of their members. For this there must be adequate resources to promote wholesome development in terms that promote the identities of indigenous peoples. In other words, development and cultural identity are inseparable. And development in the comarcas must be built under the autonomous direction of the aboriginal peoples themselves.