[Lasa] Using courts to harass Ecuador's dissidents, by Manuela Picq

[Marc Becker]

Using courts to harass Ecuador's dissidents
by Manuela Picq

Ecuadorian former minister and activist Monica Chuji is about to face 
trial for defamation. The president's secretary of administration, 
Vinicio Alvarado, accuses her of defamatory libel for describing him as 
nouveau riche in a February interview.

While this lawsuit against a former cabinet member reveals the extent of 
the persecution against those opposing the government of Rafel Correa, 
it also calls attention to the lingering permissibility of harassing 
indigenous peoples in the region.

Alvarado, the accuser, asks for three years of jail as well as 
US$400,000 for "moral damages". Chuji's lawyer, a recognised 
constitutional law expert, working with the support of the human rights 
organisation INREDH, contends the accusation is political and holds no 
legal ground.

Angering the nouveau riche

Alvarado has become one of the most powerful people in Correa's 
government. Previously working with President Abdala Bucaram, Alvaredo 
is connected to powerful business sectors in the coastal region. He is 
the person in charge of Correa's entire publicity apparatus, a key 
position in an administration that has made image and communication a 
key tool of governance. Over the past year, corruption scandals 
surrounded the publicist, and the magazine Vanguardia ran a cover story 
on his obscure businesses with Carondelet.

When Chuji told a journalist that Alvarado was amongst the nouveau 
riches that had acquired wealth in the current administration, she 
merely echoed what others had voiced before her. The difference was the 
political position she placed herself in.

Chuji had not only resigned as a cabinet member in the Correa 
administration to join the opposition, she was publicly denouncing 
Correa's upcoming referendum as a strategy to take over the judiciary 
and censor the press. The government was getting ready for the 
referendum - barely won as dissent solidified across indigenous 
provinces - and Chuji's public remarks were less than helpful, to put it 
mildly.

 From presidential spokesperson to pariah

The crux of this case might not lay in Chuji's interview, but in the 
legitimacy she holds in criticising government policies both as a former 
cabinet member and indigenous leader.

Monica Chuji is a Kichwa from Sarayaku, Sucumbios, in the Ecuadorian 
Amazon. She has long been an activist in the Confederation of Indigenous 
Nationalities of Ecuador (CONAIE), the country's strongest social 
movement, partaking in national mobilisations as well as international 
forums such as the UN Permanent Forum for Indigenous Peoples.

Appointed Minister of Communication by Correa, she became his 
spokesperson, developing a close relationship with the president.

But when Correa sent military troops to repress a protest against oil 
drilling practices in the Amazonian town of Dayuma in December 2007, 
Chuji denounced police brutality and called for a public investigation. 
Frustrated by escalating rhetoric against indigenous mobilisation for 
collective rights and prior consent, she left Correa's cabinet to join 
the 2008 constitutional assembly.
An indigenous protest against oil drilling in Dayuma was shut down by 
troops [EPA]

She acted as an Assembly Member for the governing party, Alianza Pais, 
on the commission on Natural Resources and Biodiversity throughout the 
controversial negotiations on water, oil and mining. Chuji left the 
party as soon as the Assembly process was finalised-with others 
following her lead.

Her letter of resignation denounced the government's practices of 
criminalisation, cooptation and censorship of social movements, 
stressing that the impossibility of expressing dissenting ideas was 
putting democracy at risk. As Correa's sole and last indigenous cabinet 
member, her departure locked the government into a conflictive 
relationship with the indigenous movement.

It might be tricky to find Chuji guilty of defamation. She is, however, 
a symbol of Correa's broken relationship with social movements and the 
bases he claims to represent.

Litigation in a politicised judiciary

Alvarado still needs to prove defamation and moral damage to the court 
on November 18. Frivolous litigation, the practice of pursuing claims 
that are insufficient or hold no underlying justification in fact, is 
rarely engaged with the intention to win. The goal, instead, is to 
exercise pressure on the accused: Silencing through intimidation and the 
burden of legal proceedings. This has precisely been Correa's strategy 
in dealing with his opposition.

The case of Monica Chuji is not an isolated one.

There are currently more than 200 lawsuits of this kind filled against 
activists who oppose government policies. This lawsuit, insists Chuji, 
should be read as political retaliation; a mere thread in the larger 
political fabric of sustained harassment and censorship against voices 
of opposition to the administration.

Political retaliation may be particularly easy, given the current 
dismantlement of judicial autonomy. The May 7 referendum provided Correa 
authority to revamp the judiciary apparatus. A commission appointed by 
the government started re-structuring the legal sector in July, and will 
be evaluating its 8,000 employees over the next 18 months. Only those 
who meet the evaluation standards will keep their positions.

In the commission's first week, 48 judges were removed - reiterating an 
all-too-familiar trend where presidents govern through the courts.

The vulnerability of indigenous opposition

The defamation case against Chuji reveals much more than resentment due 
to alleged name-calling. This case is symptomatic of the Ecuadorian 
government's growing authoritarian practices, as well as the dangerous 
loss of judiciary autonomy.

Chuji was one of Correa's closest cabinet members, and the lawsuit 
illustrates the government's willingness to persecute opposing views, 
even if they come from its own members.

Furthermore, the case falls at the intersection of the government's 
two-track strategy to undermine political opposition. On one front, 
Correa's administration has been targeting the media, instigating fear 
and fostering self-censorship to disable the emergence of political 
alternatives. Journalists have been repeatedly harassed and aggressed, 
and lawsuits have been used to punish opposition in the media, the most 
visible case being that against the newspaper El Universo.

On another front, Correa's government has worked hard to debilitate 
indigenous dissent.

The indigenous movement has the largest mobilisation capacity in 
Ecuador, a historical record for overthrowing governments, and the 
ability to organise beyond expected (i.e., controllable) political 
spaces. If it holds more mobilisation capacity, however, it is also more 
vulnerable to class hierarchy for its very composition - grassroots, 
rural and mostly poor.

In that sense, Correa's government can levy a disproportionate amount of 
legal repression against indigenous activists, generating limited 
outcry, because it bears low political costs. In a society marked by 
racial divides, repressing indigenous opposition is more affordable - if 
not permissible.

What may be a frivolous lawsuit in legal terms could force Chuji to seek 
political asylum. But it does not need to be so. Correa is not only a 
savvy politician but has no political leader that could stand against him.

As indigenous contestation gains momentum across the region, President 
Correa may consider revamping his relationship with legitimate social 
movements to reframe his political legacy towards more democratic 
credentials. Not because it is the right thing to do (and it is), but 
because it might be the most effective way to stay in power.

Manuela Picq has just completed a position as a visiting professor and 
research fellow at Amherst College. She is currently writing a book on 
indigenous peoples' rights in the Amazon.

The views expressed in this article are the author's own and do not 
necessarily represent Al Jazeera's editorial policy.

Source:
Al Jazeera
http://www.aljazeera.com/indepth/opinion/2011/11/2011111293615102659.html