Blog

The lawsuit against the Ecuadorian government

One of the most impactful policies and initiatives carried out by Nemonte Nenquimo concerns the lawsuit against the Ecuadorian Government.

To provide context, in 2021, President of Ecuador Guillermo Lasso issued two executive decrees: Decree 95 and Decree 151. The former proposed a transition ‘in which control and management of strategic sectors pass from the hands of the State to transnational companies,’ as reported by Amazon Frontlines. This meant that, according to the decree, oil companies would have experienced an accelerated process to obtain authorization for drilling in the territory through a deregulation process.

This made it easier for oil companies to invest in the territory in exchange for fewer bureaucratic hurdles and tax incentives. On the other hand, the latter sought to ‘increase mining exports and make Ecuador more appealing to foreign investors,’ always at the expense of the territory.

However, not only did the decrees clearly represent a threat to the territorial integrity of Ecuador and the lives of local tribes, but as the Supreme Court of Ecuador would later find, they also constituted clear violations of the rights to prior consultation  granted nationally and internationally to the Waorani community and the tribes joining the class action.

First and foremost, Nemonte claimed that the decrees violated the Waorani people’s right to prior, free, and informed consultation and consent for any decision, whether normative or administrative, directly affecting them. This right is recognized in Indigenous and Tribal People Convention Convention 169, as well as in the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, the American Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, and in articles 57, numbers 7 and 17, of the Ecuadorian Constitution of 2008, which was ratified by the Constitutional Court of Ecuador. This undeniably led to considering oil and mining as activities significantly influencing the life of the communities.

Additionally, in their effort to join the Climate Leader to demand the annulment of the aforementioned executive decrees, these appear contrasted given the International Energy Agency (IEA) highlighting the urgency of halting fossil fuel production in the Amazon and the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). These organisations declared that the climate emergency can be mitigated only if urgent decisions are taken at the highest levels of government to halt global warming.

Considering these claims and the fact that Ecuador was indeed the first country to recognize environmental rights in 2008, the Supreme Court of Ecuador temporarily suspended the President’s executive decrees in 2023 to allow environmental consultation for mining and oil projects in the contested territory, seeking legitimacy for the plan through a referendum.

‘Our Rainforest is Not for Sale’ online campaign

Nemonte Nenquimo partnered with the organisation Amazon Frontlines to create the online campaign titled ‘Our Rainforest is Not for Sale’, focusing on raising global awareness and support in the fight to protect the Amazon rainforest against human activity, namely oil drilling and mining. This campaign is a key reason why the lawsuit against the Ecuadorian government was taken seriously and the government’s expansion of the oil industry into Waorani native lands was halted. This was achieved through the international cooperation in the form of a petition which gathered 378,000 signatures, demonstrating global support, this sheer number of supporters demonstrates Nemonte’s ability to connect people worldwide in favour of nature. 

Amazon Frontlines is the Ceibo Alliance’s sister organisation and is readily supported by many celebrities after gaining international recognition. The campaign was based around spreading the message of the indigenous people and ultimately gaining support for the Waorani’s petition in order to demonstrate the force behind the movement and achieving change within Ecuador.

Some hashtags associated with the campaign were ‘#waoraniresistance’ which has been used in 6,291 posts and ‘#savetheamazon’ (although not exclusive to this campaign was used in collaboration with indigenous activism and used in a total of 117,735 posts). These hashtags were also used in conjunction with photos of the Amazon rainforest to demonstrate its importance to each and every life and its natural beauty as well as the threats it is facing today. 

Celebrities such as Mark Ruffalo and Nina Gualinga shared photos expressing their support for the movement as well as educating their followers on the destruction of the Amazon rainforest. Leonardo di Caprio also tweeted about Nemonte and her cause, encouraging people to sign the petition. His tweet received 3,100 likes and 124 comments, portraying the campaign’s international reach. The strategy of gaining support from celebrities with large followings allowed the message to be spread across the world, touching people’s hearts across the globe and gaining momentum to the movement. 

Alongside the Amazon Frontlines petition, other petitions campaigning for the rights of indigenous people living in the Amazon against the oil industry are also circulating and garnering support, demonstrating a further international awareness of this issue through this policy. Furthermore, Nemonte collaborated with organisations such as Amazon Watch in order to further spread the message and create traction around the petition. 

Despite the fact that this  online campaign is not particularly country specific, it aided the indigenous Ecuadorian tribes against the government by demonstrating how the destruction of the Amazon rainforest is a globally recognised and supported issue, creating a mass of international pressure. It forced the Ecuadorian government to accept that the Waorani’s fight is not one to be overlooked, and that it in fact must be addressed as it holds a global importance.

This was furthered by the media coverage of the campaign, with major media outlets such as the New Yorker and the Guardian reporting on the story, bringing the issue to the forefront of the Ecuadorian government’s agenda and heightening public disapproval through public pressure and awareness of the consequences of opening up the oil industry. 

Furthermore, the international supporters of the petition and the cause were encouraged to send emails to Ecuadorian government officials, depicting their concern and opposition to their plans. This tactic continues today as on Amazon Frontlines’ ‘Take Action’ page where they encourage the public to send the acting President of Ecuador Daniel Noboa a message to stop drilling for oil with the following slogan: ‘Tell him that the clock is ticking and the world is watching’. 

Amazon Sacred Headwaters Initiative

In 2017, when the tribes of the Amazon came together to protect their 35 million hectares of land, The Sacred Headwaters Alliance was born, proposing a planning tool for social and ecological transition called the Bioregional Plan. The initiative takes its name from the indigenous tribes’ view that the forest is a living organism comprising plants, humans, and animals. As suggested by Fundación Pachamama, the initiative’s name is inspired by the concept of “Yakumana,” meaning “mother water,” referring to the river that supports life in the forest. 

Nemonte Nenquimo, the leader and co-founder of the initiative, makes it particularly relevant because unlike other projects she has started, this one has a cross-border element, extending beyond Ecuador to neighbouring countries such as Peru. In addition, it also has horizontal application by involving and gaining financial contributions from not only tribes but also government agencies, local NGOs, and lobbyists (including Pachamama Alliance, Amazon Watch, CONFENIAE in Ecuador, and AIDESEP in Peru).

The initiative has five Bioregional objectives: to strengthen Amazonian well-being by improving the lives of the population, maintaining biodiversity and cultural vitality; to ensure indigenous self-determination and territorial governance; to halt the advance of extractive industries by expanding protected areas; to promote forest and river conservation and restoration by prioritising the protection of 49.4 million acres (20 million hectares) of unprotected tropical forest of high biodiversity in Peru and Ecuador, as well as restoring more than 21.4 million acres (8.7 million hectares) of forest needed to maintain the connectivity of the Andean-Amazonian ecosystem and eliminate forest loss and ecosystem degradation.

To achieve this, the initiative has worked to develop a system of biophysical indicators to measure and evaluate “good way of living” (or Buen Vivir) – a central notion in Ecuador prescribing a quality lifestyle…. In addition they worked to generate a proposal for the creation of an intergenerational oil fund, ensure strong control over environmental licences issued by regulatory entities for extractive activities, construct and maintain a binational network of territorial defenders of the Amazon. This, in addition to the efforts to advocate for the Recognition of the Napo Tigre Indigenous Reserve (1,023,137 ha), and conduct a transaction to prevent land trafficking in Peru between the Awajún Nation and settlers. 

In terms of conservation, the goal is to demand recognition for the knowledge of the peoples and nationalities of the Sacred Headwaters and also to benefit from the use of genetic resources from the region. They aim to implement an autonomous energy model with renewable energies in difficult-to-access Amazon forest areas. One proposal under this last point is to form an InterGAD Articulation System between governments for Amazon Urban Planning (SAIGPUA) through the implementation of solar micro-generators and electric public transports. 

IExRAIA Summer Research Program:

This article is an excerpt from a report about Nemonte Nenquimo produced as part of an RAIA research program on climate leaders. For a full picture of Nenquimo’s climate leadership read the full report. This project was fully financed by IE University’s IE School of Politics, Economics and Global Affairs.

Authors: Lucinda Schüler and Matilde Romagnoli

Editor: Ksenia Kumanina

Project Lead: Francia Morales