SATIIM looks for long term benefits from oil exploration

We’ve seen them in the streets of Belize City as well as the halls of the Supreme Court. But on Friday members of the Toledo based organisation called SATIIM hosted journalists in their own backyard. News Five’s Kendra Griffith reports.

Kendra Griffith, Reporting
The Sarstoon-Temash National Park is named after the two rivers that drain the southernmost territory of Belize?s most remote district. But beneath these languid waters lies a strong current of controversy. Petroleum has been discovered in Cayo and the prospect of a strike is already dividing Toledo.

Greg Ch?oc, Executive Dir., SATIIM
?This is what that battle is all about, the legal battle in the Supreme Court. The resources in here is for the people of Belize, more importantly it has been what the community who lives close to the park has traditionally used, and which their livelihoods depend on.?

Consisting of almost forty-two thousand acres of wetland and forests, the park was declared a protected area in 1994. But the decision by government to do so was met with ambivalence by the five surrounding communities. They had traditionally used the forests for hunting and building materials and its rivers for fishing. Because residents are no longer allowed to exploit the protected area, SATIIM feels that neither should an oil company.

Greg Ch?oc
?We believe that oil exploration in the park is prohibited by law.?

Kendra Griffith
?Which section of the law specifically are you quoting when you say that??

Greg Ch?oc
?Section six where it lists what you cannot do in the park. But there is also a provision in section six where it refers to section seven which is the ministerial discretion, which means that the minister can make exemptions if he deems that the activity will not have adverse impacts on the environment.?

Kendra Griffith
?And you don?t think this is one of those cases??

Greg Ch?oc
?That?s what we are saying yes. Moreover, we think that it is not consistent with the principle, the rationale and the purpose that created the national park or any protected area in this country.?

?If there is oil beneath the soil of Belize, let?s develop it and let?s extract it. But there are laws all must follow. There are the environmental protection act and there is the national park acts. We cannot do as there is no law in the country.?

Kendra Griffith
?I think it was you who said it, that government can tomorrow change the law and say, okay we can allow drilling in national parks if it?s for oil exploration in the case that they might find it. You all would be satisfied then??

Greg Ch?oc
?That?s an option for the state. I can?t say anything, that?s an option for the state.?

Kendra Griffith
?Now, I am saying that if they do that and it?s the law then that how it?s admissible for them to do that you all wouldn?t have a problem with that??

Greg Ch?oc
?Well as I said if government decides to do that, they are the government. They have always, over the course of since independence, put in law that we don?t like and we have to live with it. So I guess I don?t know what?I am not SATIIM, there are many people involved in SATIIM and we need to look at our options then.?

And while those legal issues will be sorted out by the Supreme Court, SATIIM is also focussing on the environmental damage that they say the seismic testing will cause. That testing consists of cutting a series of trails through the area.

Greg Ch?oc
?The government is suggesting that it?s only the width of a man. The company is saying it?s four to five feet. Even that itself contradicts the government and the company. And we feel that cutting seismic lines in the park is going to make islands of mini forests that will probably not support the kind of biodiversity that we now have in the park. Invasive specie from an ecological perspective may be introduced.?

The signs with red cloths represent the areas U.S. Capital will be clearing to conduct its tests. A total of fourteen lines will be cut diagonally across the park. Small explosions will be set off and delicate instruments and computers will create a map of the underground terrain … kind of like a geological ultrasound.

But while reasonable people may debate the ecological impact of oil exploration, the more you talk to residents, the more you realise that for the villagers of Crique Sarco, Midway, Barranco, Sunday Wood, and Conejo, the great controversy revolves around money … or rather the lack of it.

Midway Resident
?Our living here in Midway is farming. We are all farmers. We plant beans and we plant rice. We have a market here for rice. We the people plant beans here, but it is still very difficult to sell because we don?t have a market. We have to try our best to ship it somewhere like across the border, but it is very hard. That?s how we are living and some of us go out and look for jobs. Maybe for two weeks or a month, and then we wait for our rice production to be ready to harvest. Then we come back home ready to work on it and sell it out to the marketing board.?

Domingo Bah, Chair Sunday Wood
?Our livelihood is just like this, just farmers. Rice, corn and beans, that?s all we do. That?s all. When that?s done it?s done then another year then we could say a lee bit more benefits and that?s why now we say we want to get a lee job from the oil company. I think that would help for the majority of the people.?

Irma Gonzalez, Barranco Resident
?I would agree with the oil company, because I think they will be bringing jobs to the community. I think everybody I think could find something to do at least over the holidays. At least for three months like they were saying. I think people are looking for the jobs.?

Kendra Griffith
?Is job a big issue in Barranco??

Irma Gonzalez
?I think so. I think we are living here by the grace of God, so when this whole project come along I think it will be a big help for the people in the village.?

It?s an issue that even SATIIM Executive Director Greg Ch?oc admits is complex.

Greg Ch?oc
?I am also recognising that they are between a rock and a hard place. They have needs, they need cash, there is no employment here and we grab at anything that comes our way. Whether it affects us later on, we want to leave it until then, we want to cross the bridge when we reach that point. I think if we are to be strong and ensure that we play an active role in our development processes, then we have to learn from the mistakes of the past, we have to learn from mistakes made by communities and strengthen ourselves.?

But strength is only accomplished through unity, a quality that is right now in short supply. All sides agree that Toledo needs development; what they fear is that even if oil is discovered, the wealth will once again flow everywhere but where it is needed most.

Kendra Griffith reporting for News Five.

SATIIM’s next Supreme Court hearing is on July nineteenth.