Sierra Leone's delimitation of Santa Marta provokes controversy – Government – Politics

This Friday the controversy intensified around the draft decree that delineates the Línea Negra appeal in the Sierra Nevada de Santa Marta, which would increase the "sacred spaces" protected in this territory. 19659002] What generated the nervousness was the draft decree that the Ministry of Interior has downloaded on its web page, in which it observes new recognitions to the ancestral.

The text of the decree, which rested in the legal office of the House of Nariño for several months and will be signed by President Juan Manuel Santos next week, would increase the protected area from 54 to 348 "sacred spaces" ". But Interior Minister Guillermo Rivera said Friday that "this does not mean that these sites will become indigenous territories or that private property will be affected."

According to Rivera, there is no room for "building unjustified fears" and stated that Santos will sign the decree because it is a mandate of the Constitutional Court.

The Black Line "is a special protection area, because of the spiritual and cultural value it has for four indigenous peoples: Koguis, Wiwas, Arhuacos, and Kankuamo ," according to the decision of the Constitutional Court which orders its protection, and includes the territory of three departments: Cesar, La Guajira and Magdalena.

This area was first demarcated in 1973, when a resolution of the then government ministry created the Sei Shizha (black line) with 39 sacred points in its interior.

But the controversy began in 2014, when Rogelio Mejía Izquierdo, governor of Arhuaco, brought an action tutela against the regional autonomous society of Cesar (Corpocesar), which had granted a license to operate a material depot in the black line, "without having practiced the procedure of prior consultation."

The Constitutional Court granted Mejía the right, deprived Corpocesar of the environmental license of this exploitation and granted "the rights self-determination, subsistence, ethnic diversity and prior consultation "of the ethical communities that inhabit this territory.

Santos said this week that the decree "does not grant environmental authority to indigenous peoples" and that "any suggestion on this subject has been removed from the text".

In Decree 348, the "sacred spaces" are determined within the black line. Among these are iconic places such as Alfonso López Square, the Hurtado well on the Guatapurí River, the Church of La Concepción, the Santa Marta Bay and the beaches of Riohacha.

A group of 10 unions sent a letter to Santos protesting because "the technical criteria used for the expansion of the Black Line are not known" and that this new delimitation would have "an effect economic and social negativity ".

Authorities in the three departments on the black line expressed concern over the possible interference of indigenous communities in municipal development plans.

Germán Arce, Minister of Mines and Energy, sent another communication to the Ministry of the Interior in which he expressed this same concern. "Non-renewable natural resources belong to the state Explained: [TRADUCTION] Julio Suárez, director of Corpocesar, believes that even if the decree lacks clarity," in the context of competition, it is it is impossible to limit the use and exploitation of indigenous peoples, it leaves everything in the current legal domain, that is, environmental authorities and territorial entities continue to have jurisdiction over the territory. "[19659002] President Santos was yesterday in Sierra Nevada, and although there are versions that the decree would be disclosed on the occasion of his visit, Casa de Nariño informed that this decision had been postponed for next week in order to have time to make the respective changes