The United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples has existed for 3 years. It was adopted on September 13, 2007 by the UN General Assembly following more than twenty years of discussion within the UN system on the topic. As outlined in the preamble to the document, indigenous people are among the most impoverished, marginalized and victimized people in the world. I undertook research for a Master of Sciences degree in the Wild Coast South Africa in 2007, and the idea of the AmaMpondo representing an indigenous people valued for their unique cultural and historical value was not an idea that had currency at that time. However, since recently the AmaMpondo people have been officially recognized by the United Nations as having a culture and a tradition which is of great intrinsic cultural value.

The development battlefield of the Wild Coast is approaching its most important legal battles to be fought, since in the upcoming months of 2010 some important decisions will be made which will have lasting implications for the rural communities of the Wild Coast. The AmamPondo are an indigenous people, and this is only being recognized as of late according to the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, and this development can help to achieve the objective of improving the situation of local communities in the Wild Coast and in the long term too the situation of indigenous peoples the world over.

“Indigenous peoples have the right to selfdetermination. By virtue of that right they freely determine their political status and freely pursue their economic, social and cultural development.” (United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, Article 3) Sustaining the Wild Coast is a section 21 NGO working with a loose network of organizations and individuals who are concerned about bringing about development which is ecologically sound, equitable, respects indigenous AmaMpondo communities as well as their local histories and cultures and brings benefit directly to the local people. SWC wishes to disseminate and receive information, ideas, and opinions about the development predicament in which they are situated and establish practical collaborative programmes demonstrating ways out of this predicament. This situation comprises the fact that the South African Pondoland Wild Coast, a Local indigenous AmaMpondo communities have systematically had their human rights infringed upon due to these development plans by means of inequitable governance processes, intimidation and silencing alternative views on development throughout the exploratory and planning phases of mining in recent years. SWC takes their lead from local rural AmaMpondo communities and is united with them by a concern to prevent the undermining and displacement of those local communities, their livelihoods and their life worlds.

There have been serious shortcomings in the approaches employed to engage with local indigenous communities and a ‘top down’ method of project development which has entailed that the government’s proposals for projects like the mining occurs with no or insufficient consultation with communities leading to projects which are radically out of step with indigenous communities observations and needs. SWC is concerned that the proposed mining and road developments focus on bringing about a type of economic growth which favours capital accumulation by an elite minority of interest groups which stand to benefit from the construction of the mine and road which will occur at the expense of the AmaMpondo indigenous communities who have historical and cultural ties with the land.

This call for attention is supported by the experience of the AmaMpondo of having been systematically impeded in exercising their democratic right to resist the imposition of a development trajectory which brings about unacceptable inequities in land and resource distribution, leading to the benefit of a privileged few, degradation of irreplaceable unique biodiversity and ecosystem functions and values as well as marginalisation and displacement of indigenous and local communities. SWC is not opposed to all development, it is opposed only to inequitable and unsustainable development and supports any initiatives to develop environmentally sustainable, community-based, environmentally sound economic activities in the region.

If you would like to contribute to NGO Sustaining the Wild Coast whether it be by joining the mailing list, conducting research, financial donation or any other means please do not hesitate to contact Val Payn, Communications co- coordinator, Sustaining the Wild Coast Campaign. Email: swcoastval@gmail.com

extract from: NetWURK E-Magazine

Posted on June 25th, 2010
Filed under: Newspaper and Media