Peru – the guardian of the mountain lake

Daniel Chaupe carefully controls the white lacquered taxi on the barrier on the Lagune Chailhuagon in Peru, where a small guard house is installed. “This is a public way, but here you check everything,” whispers the gaunt, young man. You, this is the largest mining company in the Cajamarca region: the Goldmine Yanacocha. The gigantic mine, in operation since 1993, has left deep traces in the landscape. The bright craters can be seen from almost every survey around the old Inca city of Cajamarca. Then Daniel Chaupe lives and as a taxi driver and casual worker he earns his money.

Today he is on his way to his parents and the guard on the barrier, after a brief look, lets him pass into the ID. “Happy,” explains Daniel with a helpless laugh. Early in the morning, he loaded firewood onto the loading area of ​​the pick-up, stringed jacks and a few other things and broke up to arrive for the second breakfast on his parents’ small farm. This is separated from a stable steel fence next to a breeding station for alpaacas.

It is windy, fog swaths slide over the meadows characterized by thick mosses and grasses to around 4000 meters above sea level. Slowly the all -wheel drive taxi sways across the dirt road, at the end of which a little woman wrapped in a ceiling stands: Máxima Acuña. Next to it is a strong man who pulled his hat deep into his forehead to avoid the light drizzle. Daniel greets his parents warmly and disappears like everyone else behind the protective tarpaulin behind which a small fire blazes.

“You came to our property, once even destroyed the house. Treated us badly, beat us. “

Maximum Acuña

Potato soup, fresh relaxed cheese and some coffee are available for breakfast. The warm meal is doing well after the almost four -hour drive from the center of the old Inca city of Cajamarca. There and in Cusco, 2000 kilometers away, the Inca Atahualpa ruled until the Spaniards kidnapped him in 1532, exchanged gold and massacrated him a little later. Cajamarca has never lost the connection to the gold. Nowadays the symbol for this is called Yanacocha: the largest gold mine Latin America. It literally enthroned over the city with 230,000 inhabitants. For more than 30 years, companies have been giving the region’s wealth out of the rocks. And for that, the mighty mine, behind which the US group Newmont Corporation is standing, also stretched out the hand according to the property of Máxima Acuña and Jaime Chaupe.

In sight

“I bought the terrain in 1994 from my husband’s uncle. I can also prove that with the purchase contract, «explains the little woman, barely larger than 1.50 meters, with a large routine. “I have this sentence a hundred times between 2010 when it started and pronounced today,” the lively woman pushes behind with the optimistic flashing eyes. Until 2010, the Acuña-Chaupa family-two adults and four children-lived in peace on the approximately 25 hectare plot. Potatoes, beans, some vegetables have grown Jaime Chaupe, a few rabbits, chickens, of course, but also sheep, cows and donkeys held and every now and then the couple with one of the donkeys as a pack animal marches to one of the markets to sell and buy. This is called subsistence agriculture and the couple was satisfied with it – despite the cold, the rough climate between the mountain lakes.

But in 2010 the guards appeared for the first time, heavy equipment was brought close to the family of the wind. Thereupon Máxima Acuña took the initiative, grabbed her purchase contract, drove down to Cajamarca to the offices of the Yanacocha company and insisted on speaking a senior engineer. “I wanted clarity, an end of all upcoming work on my and around my property,” she recalls.

But first she was told that the entire terrain belonged to society that had been bought up. Nobody listened to her, nobody took the indigenous woman seriously with the broad hat. “Later they came back on our property, destroyed things, and even the house. Treated us badly, my husband, my children. Even beaten, «she explains in a shaky voice. You tried to drive them out, Acuña is sure. Then she drinks something out of the coffee mug, shakes as if she wants to get rid of the lousy memories. “Again and again it was said that we were illegal land occupiers,” she complained with a tired hand movement.

She is exhausted, finally wants to live in peace. “But they don’t let me,” complains the woman, who many in the neighborhood only “call the lady from the blue lagoon”. The blue lagoon is one of four lagoons around its property.

Committed to the water

Water is essential for the lively woman of around 55 years. She is used to drinking from the small stream that pre -tied at the front of the house. This is normal for all neighbors in the region. But most of the people sold their properties to Mine Yanacocha. Also a reason why the company does not let go of and the Acuña-CHOPI family only wanted to drive away by violence and when that did not work with legal means.

But Máxima Acuña and Jaime Chaupe are still there. After the two were sentenced to two years and eight months in prison for land in July 2014 in the first instance of Celendín, their community, the appeal negotiation in Cajamarca followed half a year later. Máxima Acuña made it a nationwide woman, because in the spectacular process the almighty mining company pulled the loser. Acuñas’ land title was recognized that she and her husband were able to leave the courthouse as free people and not only international attention, but also the experienced environmental client Mirtha Vásquez was responsible.

At that time, the process was both a turning point in the case law of Peru and in dealing with a gigantic investment project of $ 4.8 billion. “That would have messed up the region’s water balance sustainably,” said Mirtha Vásquez, which continues to do with the case. »At least four lagoons, square kilometers of the pasture crossed by water veins, but also several ridges should disappear at the time. The entire water balance of the region is at the game with the project, «said Vásquez in spring at a meeting in Cajamarca.

At that time, the lawyer and university lecturer once again worked with one of the appeal negotiations that the group regularly commissioned. “You don’t let up,” explains Vásquez and Máxima Acuña also feels that. »We have to continue to defend ourselves, civil law, pay for a lawyer, regularly present in court. It is expensive and tiring, says Acuña and rubs her back on her son Daniel. The children support their parents as well as they can, because the money for litigation is scarce, although Máxima Acuña 2016 was awarded the world’s most important environmental award, the Goldman Environmental Prize. “But almost everything went into the processes,” explains the little woman, pressing the water out of the cheese that she wants to give her son later. Cheese, one or two chickens, the two parents can always make it unnecessary, but they don’t know how things will go on in the long term.

“There is more and more corruption in Peru, mining almost always has a right of way, we are under pressure,” says Máxima Acuña and her husband Jaime Chaupe. “We have lost our President Pedro Castillo and now a clique rules here that has its own advantage,” judges the rather silent man. This coincides with the assessment of Mirtha Vásquez, which knows exactly that it is continuing to work on the Conga project behind the scenes. »In February, Dina Boularte, our interim president, met those responsible for the Newmont Corporation in Davos at the World Economic Forum. It’s not a good sign, «she says.

In view of the extremely investor -friendly orientation of the currently incumbent and known government for corruption scandal, Vásquez is worried about her former client. This is depressed when she takes her son and the visitor to the car after a walk through the flowering potato field. One last hug, then Daniel is back at the wheel.