BELIZE CITY, Thurs. Feb. 10, 2022– This week, AMANDALA interviewed Dr. Kristina Baines, an associate professor in anthropology from the City University of New York (CUNY), who has carried out research in the Maya communities of Toledo since 2009 and who reached out to express concerns regarding the manner in which the Free, Prior, and Informed Consent Protocol that is to govern the use of Maya communal lands is being handled, and the move by the current government to seemingly undermine the legitimacy of the Toledo Alcaldes Association as a unified voice for the alcaldes representing the Maya communities in the south.
“What caught my attention is that I’ve worked extensively since 2009 in the Maya villages in Toledo, and have seen first-hand the consultation that the TAA and the Maya Leaders Alliance; both the Toledo Alcaldes Associations and the Maya Leaders Alliance being intersecting organizations – I’ve seen how, in working and consulting in the villages in my role as an ethnographer, I’ve also been part of the organization of the alcaldes when they initially brought forward the case to the CCJ all the way through and how their representation occurred; and so my concern is that it seems to me that there is something that is happening right now that is not recognizing the 22-year longevity of the TAA and the MLA as representatives of the alcaldes,” Dr. Baines said.
The TAA has traditionally acted as a body that collectively represents the alcaldes who govern the villages in southern communities. Many of these communities continue to lack the funding and technical expertise to properly carry out negotiations with entities such as the government on their own. The role of the TAA has traditionally been to act as a body through which these village leaders can acquire information relevant to decisions to be made by these communities, and by means of which resources can be mobilized, consultation on important matters can be carried out, and experiences and best practices can be shared between the communities.
Dr. Baines stated that any attempt to undermine or question the legitimacy and importance of that organization is not in the spirit of the 2015 Consent Order handed down by the government, and would prevent meaningful negotiations with the government across many villages.
“From what I’ve seen, the alcaldes have the authority, and they meet with their communities’ members, but there is a structure; they don’t all have the time or the expertise to interact with the government, while the TAA will come into villages if they have specific issues,” Dr. Baines explained.
She added, “The alcaldes make decisions with the communities, so they go back into the communities, they talk with the communities, they say ‘okay, what do we want to do on this land, what do we want to allow’, … and then if they want to do something they are able to come into the MLA/TAA, they offer space, they offer food, transportation, they can talk to other alcaldes about how it works in their village and think about what kinds of regulations would allow them to continue the things that are important to their communities while still given the flexibility for the alcaldes to make their own decisions. So, just because there are these organizations that allow the alcaldes to come together, just because there are these organizations that present a unified voice to government doesn’t mean that there is no flexibility within the system for them to do what’s best for their community.”
Baines noted that, without this system in place, it would be difficult for them to coordinate the work of alcaldes within the various communities.
“There are systems of governance in the villages that, while they intersect with the government of Belize, they don’t have the resources or the frameworks for putting what’s best for their villages, their decisions into a formalized framework, so the TAA and the MLA have done and continue to provide them with the resources, the language, not the ideas, they build the ideas together, so part of my concern is that these organizations are being painted as sort of this top-down approach, like they are telling the alcaldes what to do, and I’ve just not ever seen it work that way,” Dr. Baines pointed out.
She went on to note that while the government’s position may be portrayed as a way to give the alcaldes more authority, it is not practical for those community leaders to launch campaigns as individual communities, without the support of a larger, unified body.
“It isn’t practical for every single alcalde – yes, it is imperative for them to make their own decision, for their communities—but it’s not practical for them to launch a campaign in the Belizean government. There needs to be representation, and that representation should be flexible enough to allow the alcalde system to work, for each alcalde to make decisions on their own, but to come together collectively to create a protocol that allows that process to happen,” she said.
In regard to the language being used by the government in the FPIC protocol that GoB has submitted to the Caribbean Court of Justice (CCJ)—including the replacement of the word “consent” with consultation”—she said that such changes in the terminology go against the language of the 2015 CCJ Consent Order.
“The decision about what happens with land in Maya communities is with the Maya communities, and they need to consent to anything that happens on their lands. From what I can see from the CCJ order, it seems like it’s very easy to manipulate what consultation was to mean. Consent is something that’s much more clear, and I think a blurring of the language is certainly purposeful. It undermines both the spirit and the letter of the original CCJ decision,” she said.
Dr. Baines further commented that the struggle will continue, despite the dissenting views and what appears to be an undermining of the representation of the Maya people.
“From my research, this is something that I know, that it’s critical for health and livelihood of the Maya communities in Toledo for them to manage their land,” she said.
Her research focused on how health is defined and maintained in those traditional communities, and she found a nexus between wholistically healthier persons and traditional living.
“I found that those families, those communities’ members that defined themselves as most traditional in terms of their land use and in terms of their farming were those that were rated the healthiest. So, the way that Maya communities traditionally practice land use is critical to the maintenance of their health, of their bodies. Not just sought of the social health, although I look at all the layers of health, I don’t separate the social from the psychological from the physical … Traditional land use is fundamental to health and well-being and happiness,” Baines shared.
Baines remarked that she feels the world is looking at Belize’s actions as they seek an appropriate model for the resolving of similar issues in other locations, and the opportunity exists for the country to set a fitting example for governments and indigenous communities across the world to follow.
“I think the people are looking at the FPIC protocol as something that potentially that communities from all around the world can look at and think about, this is a way that we can come to the table and support our traditional practice and work with the government in this way. For me, it seems a shame for it not to play out in a way that seem to uphold the letter and the spirit of the original ruling,” Dr. Baines said.
During an interview today, however, Prime Minister Hon. John Briceño, when asked about the objections being raised by the representatives of the Mayan people to the approach being taken by government officials, said, “I think they will not be happy until we give them over the Toledo District, and that’s never going to happen under a PUP government. What we have done is what the CCJ has asked of us, is for us to set the FPIC, the Free Prior, Informed Consent, which is basically a mechanism, where we go with them, anybody that wants to do any kind of projects in that area, that they could do and present it to them. But it is not a matter that they are going to have a monopoly as to what is going to take place in that area. Toledo is a part of this country, and as a government, we have a responsibility to the people of Toledo.”
He added, “The consent, the way it has been structured or set by the CCJ is basically a process of where we go. It’s not a process where they have any kind of monopoly as to say, if you wa put wa road they have to approve, that’s not the case and will not happen under the PUP. We have a responsibility … could we end it here, we have a responsibility to the people that live in the Toledo District, we have a responsibility to the Maya people to try to improve their lives. It’s not only the MLA; the MLA is an association. We have a responsibility, and we are not going to abdicate our responsibility to the people of the Toledo District. “