EL SALVADOR: ONE COMMUNITY’S STRUGGLE FOR LAND
El Salvador. A tiny elite and huge poverty. Violence against anyone suspected of organizing the poor and impunity for those crimes – since before the civil war of 1980-1992. An Archbishop, now looked on as a martyr and a candidate for sainthood because he demanded a "preferential option for the poor."
Archbishop Oscar Arnulfo Romero took on the cause of the poor against the ruling oligarchy, the armed forces and the landowners so unequivocally as to be very like the Jesus whom he served. Because of this he was targeted for assassination, which was carried out as he was saying mass on the morning of March 24, 1980, unleashing a cruel war that killed 80,000 mostly poor civilians.
My delegation to El Salvador in March, 2010 visited a rural community that named itself after Romero, and heard a story that exemplifies the life of the poor in El Salvador today, the strength of their organized struggle for human rights, and the barriers to justice that they still face. We drove up to a cluster of tin shacks in Monsiegnor Romero Community and were ushered to chairs in the community’s open-air meeting space, sheltered from the sun by a roof of corrugated plastic. The elected president of the community, Ruth Serrano, started the telling of their history, and was followed by Raul, the head of "watch and discipline." Raul is a tall, lanky farmer/engineer who came to our meeting with reams of tattered folders and hand-drawn maps that were a meticulous record of everything the community had done over the last 5 years to obtain land and housing.
This is a squatter community, formed in 2005 when people from several different towns found out that they were not eligible to receive a USAID/government sponsored house that had been promised to poor people who had suffered displacement by the war. They had gone to meetings for 2 years only to be told that they had to own land in order to receive a house. They tried to buy land on credit, but noone would sell to them. By then, the excluded ones had gotten to know each other, and they decided to organize themselves and attempt to squat on some vacant land in the area. Their first attempt failed, ending in the arrest of 7 of the leaders. Their situation was dire, as they had given up their rental apartments and had no where to go. So two months later, they tried again. This time they approached the desired plot of land, not by road, but by bushwacking over rough terrain in the middle of the night.
Ruth described their group. There were babies, toddlers, old people along with the men and youth. It was difficult terrain and it even rained. When they got to their destination, there was no shelter, no food, nothing. Well, yes, there were ants. They erected a plastic tarp to shelter the youngest and oldest. Dawn found them there, and so did the authorities. Nearby landowners threw stones at them. But the group leaders had called a press conference, which may have saved them from immediate eviction. Three days later the National Social Fund for Housing promised to sell them this small corner of state land totaling about 10 acres, if they would get a guarantor to back them up. They scrambled. They found a guarantor! A miracle!
It was not to be so easy. The Fund for Housing raised the asking price and wouldn’t negotiate
Their bureaucratic nightmare was just beginning. Some families left, but ninety remained - and still remain. Next they went to the Human Rights Commission and to the National Legislature. The whole community went and stayed from 9:00 a.m. to midnight. They won approval to stay on the land while they continued to look for a solution.
In 2006 they found a new guarantor, Fundasol, only to find out that the government was about to sell the same land to some business for 800 times less than what had been quoted to them. They protested. The government responded by saying it wouldn’t sell the land to anyone. At this point, the community lost hope. "Why are you playing with our poverty?" they pleaded.
At that point, in February of ‘08, they were discovered by the NGO that was facilitating our delegation, CIS (Centro de Intercambio y Solidaridad - Center of Exchange and Solidarity). CIS was able to put things in perspective for them and also donated the tin and wood to replace the tattered plastic that had comprised their homes for three years.. Hope and determination returned.
We asked how the community supports itself. The men work as laborers, in farming, construction and in bricklaying. The women do domestic work in cities or sell food items at roadside stands. As they put it, "There is no dignified work." Raul, who abandoned university studies in Mexico to join this struggle, has devoted so much time to it that he has not been able to look for work for three and a half years. He has received death threats for his efforts. Water comes from a little river behind the acreage and from one faucet which is on loan to them. So far they have been denied permits for water and electricity.
Three days before our visit, the community received word that they would be granted the right to build. They think this is timed with the commemoration of the assassination of their namesake, Romero, and they would like to believe it, but they do not yet have paperwork in their hands. They know not to believe in promises, but, as Archbishop Romero said in January, 1980, "The cry of liberation of this people is a clamor that rises to God, and that now nothing nor anyone can stop."
Just as we were about to leave this small, determined, faith-filled squatter community, Candelaria stood up. She had been sitting in the front facing us because she is vice-president of the community. She looked to be about 50. She wanted to tell her story, and in doing so, she told the story of millions of poor Salvadorans. In 1975 she was among the landless peasants working in agriculture. Laborers were fed one or two meals a day consisting of one large corn tortilla with a spoonful of beans in the middle. . The beans often had dead rats and cockroaches. One day she saw the polluted beans and could not tolerate it anymore. She gathered a few co-workers and they went to the landowner to complain. The landowner’s response was, "Who are these people (who dare to complain)?" The next day bombs were dropped on their village.
Candelaria could not finish her story because we had to leave, but I knew I had just heard an oral history that matched the facts I had been learning. The year 1977 was a watershed year in terms of growing unrest in the countryside, while lay people and priests suspected of organizing the unrest were being disappeared or killed. When Archbishop Romero was assassinated on March 24, 1980 for advocating the cause of the poor, there was no turning back from civil war. I don’t know how Candelaria survived, but I now understand why she is a leader in the community named for Romero.
.
Sherrill Hogen
April, 2010
Sunday, August 29, 2010
El Salvador - A Story of Popular Resistance
EL SALVADOR - A STORY OF POPULAR RESISTANCE
To continue the story of Cinquera, a village of 1500 souls at the end of a 15 mile rutted dirt road, it is Rene’s voice that I am repeating. Pedro Ramon Fuentes, nicknamed Rene, is a handsome, strong man of 52.. His activism started at 19 when he was involved in the local peasant struggle to take over private land. Since so much of the country was in the hands of private landowners, there was no land for the peasants and no relief from poverty. This situation was the major issue in the civil war (1980-92), and El Salvador still lacks an effective agrarian reform policy.
In 1979 Rene entered the University of San Salvador – a difficult and costly project for any rural youth. Six months later, the University was closed down following the assassination of Archbishop Oscar Romero. Rene decided to join with the guerilla movement against the ruling oligarchy. He was wounded in the fighting and had to withdraw to recover. When he returned to the front, it was as a paramedic in charge of the area around Cinquera. Thus, when the war ended, he chose to settle here. He tells us this as he embraces his curly-headed three year old son, the youngest of his six children. (PHOTO OF RENE AND SON)
During 12 years of civil war there was no formal governmental structure – no mayor, no town council, no security, and no connection to a national government. Only two years after the peace accords were signed did all that return, and along with it a flood of government and non-governmental organizations rushing in to offer help - 28 in all. It was chaos. Rene tells how the people formed the Cinquera Association for Reconstruction and Development to formulate a plan that would make the influx of aid accountable to the local community. After three years, the townspeople were able to proceed with just three outside agencies under their supervision.
The Association is an example of good leadership and a well organized membership. It has created a micro-loan program, women’s and youth groups and a scholarship program. Their board of directors now includes teachers, engineers, lawyers and social workers, three of whom had been scholarship students. They established a land-purchasing program to conserve the environment, especially the forests that sheltered them during the war, water sources and native plants and animals.
It may be hard to appreciate the size and success of these efforts until you hear that up until 1992, most of the village of agricultural laborers and their children had to travel far from home to pick coffee for three months of the year in order to earn barely enough to survive. The conditions during the coffee harvest were life-threatening. It was cold, there was no water, and only the adults were served the meager ration of one large tortilla and a handful of beans twice a day. Although the children worked, only the adults were paid. Many died.
Another of Cinquera’s successes is in education. Before the war there was one primary school in Cinquera and the only high schools were 15 miles away over rough roads, with no public and little private transportation. Most families could not afford school fees. Hence, there were only 4 high school graduates. Now education is a priority. Until 1997 volunteers taught primary school, as the Ministry of Education had not yet assigned teachers here. Yet by 2008 Cinquera had its own high school and now boasts 14 college graduates. The scholarship fund is a precious commodity, and students are expected to contribute 50% of their post-graduate salaries back to the fund. Meanwhile, the Association has purchased computers and provides training to all sectors of the society, because they recognize that computer technology is necessary to enter competitions for any of the country’s scarce resources.
Archbishop Romero, now seen by many faithful in El Salvador as a saint, stated shortly before his death: "An unorganized people is a people with whom one can play games; but a people who is organized and defends its values, its justice, is a people that commands respect."
Sherrill Hogen
April 16, 2010
.
To continue the story of Cinquera, a village of 1500 souls at the end of a 15 mile rutted dirt road, it is Rene’s voice that I am repeating. Pedro Ramon Fuentes, nicknamed Rene, is a handsome, strong man of 52.. His activism started at 19 when he was involved in the local peasant struggle to take over private land. Since so much of the country was in the hands of private landowners, there was no land for the peasants and no relief from poverty. This situation was the major issue in the civil war (1980-92), and El Salvador still lacks an effective agrarian reform policy.
In 1979 Rene entered the University of San Salvador – a difficult and costly project for any rural youth. Six months later, the University was closed down following the assassination of Archbishop Oscar Romero. Rene decided to join with the guerilla movement against the ruling oligarchy. He was wounded in the fighting and had to withdraw to recover. When he returned to the front, it was as a paramedic in charge of the area around Cinquera. Thus, when the war ended, he chose to settle here. He tells us this as he embraces his curly-headed three year old son, the youngest of his six children. (PHOTO OF RENE AND SON)
During 12 years of civil war there was no formal governmental structure – no mayor, no town council, no security, and no connection to a national government. Only two years after the peace accords were signed did all that return, and along with it a flood of government and non-governmental organizations rushing in to offer help - 28 in all. It was chaos. Rene tells how the people formed the Cinquera Association for Reconstruction and Development to formulate a plan that would make the influx of aid accountable to the local community. After three years, the townspeople were able to proceed with just three outside agencies under their supervision.
The Association is an example of good leadership and a well organized membership. It has created a micro-loan program, women’s and youth groups and a scholarship program. Their board of directors now includes teachers, engineers, lawyers and social workers, three of whom had been scholarship students. They established a land-purchasing program to conserve the environment, especially the forests that sheltered them during the war, water sources and native plants and animals.
It may be hard to appreciate the size and success of these efforts until you hear that up until 1992, most of the village of agricultural laborers and their children had to travel far from home to pick coffee for three months of the year in order to earn barely enough to survive. The conditions during the coffee harvest were life-threatening. It was cold, there was no water, and only the adults were served the meager ration of one large tortilla and a handful of beans twice a day. Although the children worked, only the adults were paid. Many died.
Another of Cinquera’s successes is in education. Before the war there was one primary school in Cinquera and the only high schools were 15 miles away over rough roads, with no public and little private transportation. Most families could not afford school fees. Hence, there were only 4 high school graduates. Now education is a priority. Until 1997 volunteers taught primary school, as the Ministry of Education had not yet assigned teachers here. Yet by 2008 Cinquera had its own high school and now boasts 14 college graduates. The scholarship fund is a precious commodity, and students are expected to contribute 50% of their post-graduate salaries back to the fund. Meanwhile, the Association has purchased computers and provides training to all sectors of the society, because they recognize that computer technology is necessary to enter competitions for any of the country’s scarce resources.
Archbishop Romero, now seen by many faithful in El Salvador as a saint, stated shortly before his death: "An unorganized people is a people with whom one can play games; but a people who is organized and defends its values, its justice, is a people that commands respect."
Sherrill Hogen
April 16, 2010
.
Tuesday, August 3, 2010
EL SALVADOR - COUNTRY OF LOSSES AND POSSIBILITIES
This article is written after a week in El Salvador under the auspices of the Centro de Intercambio y Solidaridad - the Center for Exchange and Solidarity. They arranged for us to visit two government ministries and four rural communities, as well as participation in two national marches and masses to commemorate the life of Archbishop Romero.
"El Salvador" in Spanish means The Savior, and a man like Jesus walked here among the poor as Jesus did in Palestine. Both Palestine and El Salvador hold onto the spirit of their respective martyrs to give them hope as they face today’s harsh realities. El Salvador’s hero is Monsignor Oscar Arnulfo Romero, who was assassinated by order of the Armed Forces as he was saying mass on March 24, 1980.
The size of Vermont but hosting six and a half million people, El Salvador is densely populated by mostly poor peasant farmers who don’t own the land they work on. The beauty of its landscape of mountains, volcanoes, the Lempa River that crosses the entire country and its long Pacific Ocean coastline hides deep economic injustice. The unemployment rate is so high that young adults see only three options: enduring poverty, delinquency, or emigration. Over l.5 million have risked death and paid up to $10,000 on credit to get to the United States. Another half a million live in other countries. This means that over 30% of the population lives abroad in order to send money home in remittances. The country depends on this income mainly because the landowning and corporate elite siphons off the agricultural and mineral wealth of the land.
Into this scenario came the current president, elected in March of 2009. Mauricio Funes, candidate of the FMLN party that represented the interests of the poor in a bloody civil war from 1980 to 1992, made speeches and promises reminiscent of President Obama’s. And it seems that Obama is his guide and mentor on how to govern. Unfortunately for the poor, this means not disturbing the economic structures now in place. A professor of economics told us that Funes does not have power over corporate interests nor over the military, and the only hope for real change to occur lies in the power of an organized populace.
The town of Cinquera (Sinkera) IS organized. We met with two of its leaders, Mari (Ana Marina Alvarengo) and Rene (Pedro Ramon Fuentes) who told us its story. During the civil war it was completely destroyed by bombs dropped from the air. All 7,000 people, had to evacuate. They fled into the forests and mountains, or they crossed into Honduras but they were seen as guerilla sympathizers and denied work and shelter everywhere. So, after 11 years seven families returned, before the war was over, but after the guerillas had driven the National Guard from the town. They started to rebuild in spite of official military opposition and continued bombing. I try to imagine rebuilding my destroyed home and destroyed village while bombs are dropping to stop me. I imagine the desperation, the courage, and the level of organization needed to start over.
Now Cinquera has grown to 1500 people, some in search of cheap land, and there are some divisions among them. However, Mari told us, the original villagers are standing up to a concerted attempt to bulldoze their beloved church. To explain why, she told us how the people learned about Liberation Theology. Back in the 1970's a priest came to serve their church and taught a new way to read the Bible - one that spoke of a loving God who did not wish them to suffer. For example, instead of it being "God’s will" that babies died after 6 days, they found out about Tetanus and could save their babies. They learned that diarrhea could be treated, instead of having to accept it as "the evil eye." Neither did they have to accept dying in childbirth as punishment for sins. They learned to talk to each other about their problems and to help each other. It was a revolution in thinking and it brought them together for the first time. They had been kept in ignorance in order to be submissive to the ruling elite.
Then, as happens in the Catholic Church, their priest was reassigned and a new priest came. The new priest was entirely different. He tried to divide and confuse the people, saying they should be worried about communists who would destroy the Church. He denounced anyone who was organizing farmers, students or parishioners. He called in the Bishop and they ripped down all the posters in the church – posters which had biblical passages that supported liberation theology and images of M. Romero. The priest excommunicated all the parishioners when they protested his actions. Then, as the people were no longer "Christians", it became all right to massacre them, and there were many killings. Leaders were arrested from their homes in the middle of the night, so they began to sleep outside their homes. If the National Guard came for the men and didn’t find them, they killed their wives. One 16 year old girl, Aida, was raped, tortured and killed in order to instill terror.
Mari’s father had to flee, leaving his wife and eight children without support. She remembers doing farm labor as a child to help feed the family. Later, her mother fled while the children slept. It was the only way she could save her life, but what a price to pay! The National Guard took over the town and made it into a base. By 1983 it was a ghost town. When the war was finally over and rebuilding underway, the church hierarchy of this area stayed the same, part of the elite. The local priest and bishop wanted to tear down the little church, symbol of popular resistance.
To the parishioners it was inconceivable that they could lose this structure. For them too it had become a symbol. During the wartime bombardments, its facade and tower were the only things in the village left standing, which the people took as a sign. They rebuilt the church around the parts that had survived and painted the facade with a portrait of Oscar Romero and one of his sayings: "In the diverse political articulations what is of interest is the poor."
The Bishop, on the other hand, called Romero a "garbage leader", and on Good Friday of 2009 he interrupted the traditional solemn procession and abruptly kicked the people out of the church, bringing the police to enforce this unusual move. When the police withdrew, the people re-entered the church to pray. However, on Easter Sunday, the priest returned and declared that the church was private property, and not theirs to use as they wished.
Tensions grew between the church hierarchy and the parishioners. On October 13, 2009 three trucks and 4 cars parked in front of the church. One hundred and fifty men got out, intending to finish the job of destroying the church building. The first to see them were five women, who formed a line in front of the church, prepared to give their lives to save it. They sounded the town alarm gong, a spent bombshell, and soon hundreds stood with the women. The priest, in charge of the assault brigade, ordered the destruction to proceed, but the men didn’t obey. They began to leave, and soon only the priest, town mayor and riot police were left facing the defiant townspeople.
For the next seven days 90 parishioners occupied the structure around the clock. Finally the Minister of Culture came and said the church should be saved as an historical site. However, the story doesn’t end there. Right after that, the area bishop closed the church until December 23 when he came to "purify" it. This included ripping down the photos of disappeared and assassinated family members, as well as drawings, verses from the Bible and quotes from Romero. The people saved what they could. After Christmas, the bishop closed and locked the church, and so it remains...
Mari concluded her story by saying that the bishop and mayor are good at sowing seeds of discontent. As a result there is no functioning government, and a federal office is investigating charges of corruption. Looking at Mari, I could only admire the strength of the organized poor.
(More stories on El Salvador to follow.)
Sherrill Hogen
Conway, MA
413-625-9959
This article is written after a week in El Salvador under the auspices of the Centro de Intercambio y Solidaridad - the Center for Exchange and Solidarity. They arranged for us to visit two government ministries and four rural communities, as well as participation in two national marches and masses to commemorate the life of Archbishop Romero.
"El Salvador" in Spanish means The Savior, and a man like Jesus walked here among the poor as Jesus did in Palestine. Both Palestine and El Salvador hold onto the spirit of their respective martyrs to give them hope as they face today’s harsh realities. El Salvador’s hero is Monsignor Oscar Arnulfo Romero, who was assassinated by order of the Armed Forces as he was saying mass on March 24, 1980.
The size of Vermont but hosting six and a half million people, El Salvador is densely populated by mostly poor peasant farmers who don’t own the land they work on. The beauty of its landscape of mountains, volcanoes, the Lempa River that crosses the entire country and its long Pacific Ocean coastline hides deep economic injustice. The unemployment rate is so high that young adults see only three options: enduring poverty, delinquency, or emigration. Over l.5 million have risked death and paid up to $10,000 on credit to get to the United States. Another half a million live in other countries. This means that over 30% of the population lives abroad in order to send money home in remittances. The country depends on this income mainly because the landowning and corporate elite siphons off the agricultural and mineral wealth of the land.
Into this scenario came the current president, elected in March of 2009. Mauricio Funes, candidate of the FMLN party that represented the interests of the poor in a bloody civil war from 1980 to 1992, made speeches and promises reminiscent of President Obama’s. And it seems that Obama is his guide and mentor on how to govern. Unfortunately for the poor, this means not disturbing the economic structures now in place. A professor of economics told us that Funes does not have power over corporate interests nor over the military, and the only hope for real change to occur lies in the power of an organized populace.
The town of Cinquera (Sinkera) IS organized. We met with two of its leaders, Mari (Ana Marina Alvarengo) and Rene (Pedro Ramon Fuentes) who told us its story. During the civil war it was completely destroyed by bombs dropped from the air. All 7,000 people, had to evacuate. They fled into the forests and mountains, or they crossed into Honduras but they were seen as guerilla sympathizers and denied work and shelter everywhere. So, after 11 years seven families returned, before the war was over, but after the guerillas had driven the National Guard from the town. They started to rebuild in spite of official military opposition and continued bombing. I try to imagine rebuilding my destroyed home and destroyed village while bombs are dropping to stop me. I imagine the desperation, the courage, and the level of organization needed to start over.
Now Cinquera has grown to 1500 people, some in search of cheap land, and there are some divisions among them. However, Mari told us, the original villagers are standing up to a concerted attempt to bulldoze their beloved church. To explain why, she told us how the people learned about Liberation Theology. Back in the 1970's a priest came to serve their church and taught a new way to read the Bible - one that spoke of a loving God who did not wish them to suffer. For example, instead of it being "God’s will" that babies died after 6 days, they found out about Tetanus and could save their babies. They learned that diarrhea could be treated, instead of having to accept it as "the evil eye." Neither did they have to accept dying in childbirth as punishment for sins. They learned to talk to each other about their problems and to help each other. It was a revolution in thinking and it brought them together for the first time. They had been kept in ignorance in order to be submissive to the ruling elite.
Then, as happens in the Catholic Church, their priest was reassigned and a new priest came. The new priest was entirely different. He tried to divide and confuse the people, saying they should be worried about communists who would destroy the Church. He denounced anyone who was organizing farmers, students or parishioners. He called in the Bishop and they ripped down all the posters in the church – posters which had biblical passages that supported liberation theology and images of M. Romero. The priest excommunicated all the parishioners when they protested his actions. Then, as the people were no longer "Christians", it became all right to massacre them, and there were many killings. Leaders were arrested from their homes in the middle of the night, so they began to sleep outside their homes. If the National Guard came for the men and didn’t find them, they killed their wives. One 16 year old girl, Aida, was raped, tortured and killed in order to instill terror.
Mari’s father had to flee, leaving his wife and eight children without support. She remembers doing farm labor as a child to help feed the family. Later, her mother fled while the children slept. It was the only way she could save her life, but what a price to pay! The National Guard took over the town and made it into a base. By 1983 it was a ghost town. When the war was finally over and rebuilding underway, the church hierarchy of this area stayed the same, part of the elite. The local priest and bishop wanted to tear down the little church, symbol of popular resistance.
To the parishioners it was inconceivable that they could lose this structure. For them too it had become a symbol. During the wartime bombardments, its facade and tower were the only things in the village left standing, which the people took as a sign. They rebuilt the church around the parts that had survived and painted the facade with a portrait of Oscar Romero and one of his sayings: "In the diverse political articulations what is of interest is the poor."
The Bishop, on the other hand, called Romero a "garbage leader", and on Good Friday of 2009 he interrupted the traditional solemn procession and abruptly kicked the people out of the church, bringing the police to enforce this unusual move. When the police withdrew, the people re-entered the church to pray. However, on Easter Sunday, the priest returned and declared that the church was private property, and not theirs to use as they wished.
Tensions grew between the church hierarchy and the parishioners. On October 13, 2009 three trucks and 4 cars parked in front of the church. One hundred and fifty men got out, intending to finish the job of destroying the church building. The first to see them were five women, who formed a line in front of the church, prepared to give their lives to save it. They sounded the town alarm gong, a spent bombshell, and soon hundreds stood with the women. The priest, in charge of the assault brigade, ordered the destruction to proceed, but the men didn’t obey. They began to leave, and soon only the priest, town mayor and riot police were left facing the defiant townspeople.
For the next seven days 90 parishioners occupied the structure around the clock. Finally the Minister of Culture came and said the church should be saved as an historical site. However, the story doesn’t end there. Right after that, the area bishop closed the church until December 23 when he came to "purify" it. This included ripping down the photos of disappeared and assassinated family members, as well as drawings, verses from the Bible and quotes from Romero. The people saved what they could. After Christmas, the bishop closed and locked the church, and so it remains...
Mari concluded her story by saying that the bishop and mayor are good at sowing seeds of discontent. As a result there is no functioning government, and a federal office is investigating charges of corruption. Looking at Mari, I could only admire the strength of the organized poor.
(More stories on El Salvador to follow.)
Sherrill Hogen
Conway, MA
413-625-9959
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)