[Lasa] Accusations that Weaken Us All: A response to Eva Golinger’s Attack on the CONAIE

[Marc Becker]

Accusations that Weaken Us All: A response to Eva Golinger’s Attack on 
the CONAIE

  From the Ecuador Solidarity Network (ecuadorsolidaritynetwork at gmail.com
<mailto:ecuadorsolidaritynetwork at gmail.com>)
<mailto:ecuadorsolidaritynetwork at gmail.com>

On September 30, as Ecuadorians lived through a police uprising that 
seemed to put the leadership of President Rafael Correa in jeopardy, 
people from around the world tuned into Twitter to garner information 
about what was happening on the ground.

Respected lawyer and author Eva Golinger sent out tweets in rapid-fire, 
informing readers from around the world with news from her sources in 
Ecuador. But as soon as translated statements from Ecuadorian Indigenous 
groups hit the ether, Golinger tweeted 
<http://twitter.com/evagolinger/status/26018130924>:

"Be careful, there are folks in CONAIE funded by US agencies that sway 
the organization to certain positions..."

Her tweet was in response to the English translation of a statement by 
the Confederation of Indigenous Nationalities of Ecuador (CONAIE), one 
of the most powerful social movements in Latin America. In their 
statement <http://vancouver.mediacoop.ca/newsrelease/4741>, the CONAIE 
was anti-coup, but they also pointed to the fact that Correa himself had 
helped create the conditions for an uprising. The statement pointed out 
that the Correa administration has attacked and delegitimized social 
movements in Ecuador. It also criticized the "authoritarian character" 
of the government.

Golinger later wrote an article called Behind the Coup in Ecuador 
<http://machetera.wordpress.com/2010/10/01/behind-the-coup in-ecuador/>, 
which was widely circulated online. In it, she repeats her accusation 
that CONAIE has funds at its disposal from the National Endowment for 
Democracy that would somehow provoke the organization into destabilizing 
the government of Ecuador:

"Not all groups and organizations in opposition to Correa’s policies are 
imperial agents. But a sector among them does exist which receives 
financing and guidelines in order to provoke destabilizing situations in 
the country that go beyond the natural expressions of criticism and 
opposition to a government... Organizations in Ecuador such as 
Participación Ciudadana and Pro-Justicia [Citizen Participation and 
Pro-Justice], as well as members and sectors of CODENPE, Pachakutik, 
CONAIE, the Corporación Empresarial Indígena del Ecuador [Indigenous 
Enterprise Corporation of Ecuador] and Fundación Qellkaj [Qellkaj 
Foundation] have had USAID and NED funds at their disposal."

Golinger, however, provides no evidence to back up her statements and 
the evidence that has been made public in this regard, shows only that 
some individuals associated with some of the groups she names have had 
some kind of association with USAID and the NED at some point in the past.

But the CONAIE is not a US puppet and such allegations only serve to 
detract from real concerns that indigenous and non-indigenous 
organizations have been raising about legal reforms that President 
Correa has been pushing for during the last couple of years since the 
country's new constitution was passed in September 2008. Disputes 
between the CONAIE and Correa have arisen around real differences, for 
example, over the country's economic development model, the 
establishment of a plurinational state, pre-existing conflicts between 
local communities and Canadian-financed mining projects, oil industry 
expansion, as well as efforts to bring autonomous indigenous 
institutions under the control of the state.

All of these disputes have been exacerbated and complicated by repeated 
insults made directly by Correa against groups such as the CONAIE, most 
often during his weekly national radio addresses. Other attempts to 
delegitimize social organizations include serious criminal charges 
against their leadership.

Golinger presumptuously assumes the role of arbiter in defining what 
constitutes "natural expressions of criticism and opposition to  a 
government." In their September 30th statement, the CONAIE clearly 
outlined how their resistance to the government of Rafael Correa is part 
of their historical struggle to defend their rights and lands, and to 
work toward the construction of a Plurinational State. Indigenous
peoples have been involved in five centuries of struggle, which has
taken place in the courts and in the halls of congress as well as in the 
streets and on the land. Any attempts by outsiders to take agency away 
from the peoples and communities leading these struggles should be
criticized.

In the week following eptember 30th, debate has emerged over whether or 
not what took place was an actual coup attempt. While such questions are 
being raised from diverse sides of the political spectrum, from the 
perspective of social organizations that have been persistently attacked 
by Correa over the last few years, they worry that such a
characterization could be leveraged to the benefit Correa and the
further passage of new laws without substantial debate, rather that as
an opportunity to rebuild relationships and strengthen Ecuadorian democracy.

This is a complex and delicate situation and one that could be explored 
in much more detail. But it cannot simply be assumed - without wanting 
to ignore how elements of the right and their imperial backers might 
seek to take advantage of situations like these – that because groups 
are protesting against Correa that they are working on the empire's 
behalf. These kinds of accusations weaken us all, as they attempt to 
undermine years of brave and powerful organizing for freedom and justice 
by indigenous and non-indigenous people in Ecuador.


*The Alleged Coup d’Etat, Democracy, and the Indigenous Organizations*

By Marlon Santi

President, CONAIE

We, the Federation of Indigenous Nationalities of Ecuador (CONAIE, in 
its Spanish initials) and the Pachakutik Bloc, in response to the events 
of September 30, 2010, and the claims made in recent days about the 
alleged  support by USAID-NED to indigenous organizations, standing 
firmly on our historic process of bringing about a true Plurinational 
State, announce:


The struggle of the peoples and nationalities is not an individual one, 
rather, it corresponds to the collective dream of constructing a diverse 
country, inclusive of the diverse popular and social organized sectors 
that seek a real change to end the old neoliberal, exploitative 
structures and the decolonization of the institutions of the State. We 
seek a plurinational democracy, respectful of the rights of individuals, 
of collective organizations and of nature.

We energetically announce that there never was any attempted coup 
d’etat, much less a kidnapping, but an event that responded to the 
uncertain political management of the government that causes popular 
discontent through permanent aggression, discrimination and violations 
of human rights consecrated in the Constitution.

We do not recognize this dictatorial “democracy” because of its lack of 
freedom of speech, the kidnapping of all the powers of the state by the 
executive branch in its political system of one government, that does 
not generate spaces to debate the projects, and laws elaborated from the 
indigenous movement and other social sectors.

We categorically refute claims that the CONAIE, the Pachakutik Political 
Movement, the peoples and nationalities have any relationship at all 
with the organism known as USAID, previously NED, not today nor ever. To 
the contrary, we know that this organization finances the “social 
programs” of this government like the forest partnership and that, yes, 
is condemnable.

We demand the constitutional suspension of the National Congress for its 
failure to comply with the constitutional mandate that it legislate much 
less audit as it is well known that all laws are approved by the 
president’s legal minister.

We condemn the usurpation of press freedom when on September 30 all 
media not allied with the government was forced to broadcast government 
news in “cadena nacional,” a means by which all access to informationis 
controlled and manipulated with a version of the facts that does not 
inform about the real dimensions of the situation on that day in the 
country.

Quito, Ecuador, October 6, 2010

Government of the Peoples and Nationalities,

Marlon Santi

President, CONAIE