The young indigenous Mapuche leader, Patricia Troncoso has been on a hunger strike since 10 October 2007. She was given a prison sentence of 10 years and a day, accused of terrorist arson at the Poluco Pidenco property. This fire took place in December 2001 and the alleged perpetrators were tried, in the presence of “faceless witnesses” (that is to say, anonymous witnesses), under the Anti-terrorist Law created during the military dictatorship.
That is to say, it was a trial without even a minimum guarantee of due process of law as established in the Covenant on Civil and Political Rights and ratified by Chile.
The case of Patricia is not unique. There are over 20 Mapuche political prisoners in the prisons of Angol, Victoria, Lebu, Concepción, Temuco and Traiguén. Most of them have been tried under the anti-terrorist legislation which entered into force during the dictatorship of Pinochet.
To this is added the atrocious murder that occurred very recently (3 January 2008) of Matias Catrileo a 22 year-old Mapuche who was shot in the back by Chilean police.
None of this is accidental. The Chilean State has placed itself at the service of forestry companies and while the police repress, torture and kill, the legal powers criminalize the Mapuche struggle. In this respect, the historian, Víctor Toledo Llancaqueo says that “The Mapuche case is illustrative of the criminalization of social protest, as a political, media and legal process, branding acts of protest as crimes, seeking to remove social conflicts out of the political arena and take them to the criminal field. The objective of those promoting criminalization is to launch the State’s punitive powers in order to neutralize, discipline or destroy social protest.”
Toledo Llancaqueo adds that “The mass media and right-wing sectors have been key actors in the process of criminalizing Mapuche protest. Faced by the emergence of indigenous mobilization, they actively promoted making it unlawful, penalizing it and having it classed as a matter of security. For their part, the forestry companies have felt that the conflict with Mapuche communities actively damages their corporate image. Accused of ecological damages and repression of indigenous people by private guards, they have become exposed to the loss of some markets. In order to address this state of affairs, the major forestry groups are putting pressure on the government and on public opinion to get the conflicts solved by criminal courts. Thus, they have magnified the economic effects of Mapuche protests and the figure of arson.”
The situation of repression and criminalization of the Mapuche people, who are struggling to recover their ancestral territories today occupied by forestry companies, becomes more serious every day, while the State and the mass media endeavour to make it invisible. However, the solidarity of a growing number of Chileans is also increasing, and they have started mobilizing in defence of the rights of this people. In a recent declaration, they affirm that “both the crime against Matias – whose perpetrator we hope will be condemned as an example by Justice – and the unjust treatment given to Mapuche prisoners, are the result of a policy of systematic repression by the Chilean State against the Mapuche communities and at the service of the forestry, electricity and large landowning companies, that does not fall in line with our country’s position before international organizations and fora” and demand that “the Government ends this situation of institutionalized injustice, taking up an active policy of respect and in defence of the human and ancestral rights of the Mapuche people.” (See full declaration in Spanish at http://www.wrm.org.uy/paises/Chile/Declaracion_2008.html).
More than 3 months after she started her hunger strike, Patricia Troncoso tells –from prison- the Chilean people, and the world “...that the illegitimate violence of money and power, that imprisonment, persecution and criminalization of our cause, that police brutality, are not the way to solve the historical and political problem with our people. Because while you, the politicians, come and go, future generations of Mapuche people continue to germinate and grow. And the Mapuche will continue to resist your arrogance and domination. We will continue to struggle, we will continue to resist and we know that for each one that falls, ten shall rise up.” (Her message -in Spanish- may be seen in video at http://www.wrm.org.uy/Videos_Esp/Patricia_Troncoso.html).
Patricia has today become the symbol of the struggle of a people that time and time again have shown that her words are true, because for each one that fell, ten arose. And until justice is done, they will continue to arise!
By Ricardo Carrere, WRM, rcarrere@wrm.org.uy
