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In Pursuit of Autonomy: Indigenous Peoples Oppose Dam Construction on the Patuca River in Honduras

In May 2011, Cultural Survival’s Global Response program launched a letter-writing campaign at the request of Indigenous Peoples of the Moskitia, Honduras, to halt the construction of a hydroelectric dam along the pristine Patuca River. Despite years of protest from local Indigenous Peoples and international environmental groups, in January 2011 the Honduras government signed a contract with a Chinese company to start construction on the first of three dams that would have many irreversible consequences in the Moskitia, Central America’s most biologically diverse tropical wilderness.

A River Tale: Protecting a Tawahka Way of Life

Doña Rufina Cardona picks her way barefoot to the riverbank. She bends down, cupping water in one hand and wetting her face, arms, and feet. It’s early. Mist rolls off the river and up the Patuca valley; it’s just possible to make out the rainforest-covered hills on the far bank. Children washing pots in the shallows greet her with respect in the Tawahka language: Mapiris yamni Kuka—Good morning Grandmother. She sits down on a massive drift log, part of it covered in fish scales, and looks over the river. A man is poling his family upstream in their dugout, rhythmically digging a long palanka into the gravelly bed. He’s not straining.

Campaign Update – Honduras: Dam Construction Speeds Ahead in Violation of Indigenous Rights

Date: 12/01/2011

A recent article in the Honduran press declared that the Patuca III project in Olancho, Honduras, is now 20 percent through its first phase of construction. Work was initiated in June with various construction projects in the municipalities of Juticalpa, Catacamas, and Patuca, reported La Tribuna.  The article says the government will compensate over 200 property owners who will be relocated, but it doesn’t mention the thousands of Indigenous people who live downstream from the dam site and whose lives and livelihoods will be altered by the dam. Project developers have not consulted the Tawahka, Miskitu, Pech, and Garifuna peoples who live downstream along the Patuca River.

Campaign Update: Honduras – Military Evicts Residents at Dam Site

Date: 10/27/2011

Photo by Ximomara OrellanaPhoto by Ximomara OrellanaFollowing four days of protests at the construction site for the Patuca III dam, police and military personnel forcibly evicted residents yesterday to prepare for the first phases of dam construction.  Residents of Olancho whose land would be flooded by the dam have not been reimbursed for their land nor provided any kind of reparations, according to Congressman Lucas Aguilera. The Patuca III dam is the first in what is expected to be a series of dams built and financed by the Chinese company, SinoHydro.

Campaign Update – Honduras: Indigenous Peoples March on the Capital

Date: 10/10/2011

On October 10, over 100 protesters marched to the Presidential Palace in Tegucigalpa, Honduras, to demand a halt to the construction of the Patuca III hydroelectric dam. Miskitu, Garifuna and Lenca marchers called on the government to address 16 issues of concern to the Indigenous peoples of Honduras. 

Campaign Update – Honduras: Contract for Three Patuca Dams Signed

Date: 09/26/2011

On September 10, 2011, the Honduran president’s office announced that the Minister of Finance signed a contract with the Chinese company Sinohydro to build three dams on the Patuca River, with construction scheduled to start in 2012. Sinohydro expects to fund the project with loans from Chinese financial institutions. A previous contract had only contemplated one dam, Patuca III, which will be built first.

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