EL PAÍS offers the América Futura section openly for its daily and global information contribution on sustainable development.
If you want to support our journalism, subscribe
here
.
The first obvious signs began in 2005. The Wayuu Twuliá community, located in a place known as Cachaca III, one kilometer away from Riohacha, La Guajira, began to see how the sea was eating away at its coast.
The situation worsened in 2007, after six spurs were built in Riohacha to control coastal erosion in the capital.
What was a solution for some, became a problem for the inhabitants of Cachaca III, who after that construction saw the sea arrive with more force, with more sediment and, once again, eat up the coast before their eyes.
“In just two months – November and December – the community was able to register that five meters were lost,” says journalist Angie Serna, who has followed the case and recounted what the community is experiencing in a podcast about loss and damage from climate change.
The sea, so far, has taken away two homes, a swimming pool, a community hut, several trees, an ancestor cemetery and has destroyed the landing area for fishing boats, their main means of subsistence.
And despite the fact that the Government, through the deputy director for Risk Knowledge of the National Unit for Risk and Disaster Management (Ungrd), Luis Carlos Barreto, committed to carrying out a study on the subject that would provide clues on how mitigate the situation, months passed without anything happening.
A fact that motivated three people from the community to file a guardianship action – a legal figure in Colombia – in December 2023 against the Government and other entities, and which, after expiration of deadlines, has not yet been responded to by the Council of State.
“So far, five entire families are displaced in Bogotá;
The progressive advance of coastal erosion put them in danger by leaving them without means of life to survive,” explain the Wayuu leaders Pedro Fonseca Epiayu, Clarena Fonseca Uriana and Edwin Fonseca Redondo in the guardianship.
Through this action, in which they appeal to the violation of 12 rights, among them that of health, the vital minimum of water and “the violation of the human rights of people in situations of human mobility in contexts of climate change” , they ask the Council to demand from the Government two main things.
That as a precautionary measure, in the next five days health personnel and water be brought to Cachaca III.
And that they be informed of the study status that the Ungrd promised, as well as what the assigned budget is.
The case will be heard by the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights
While waiting for a response, this Thursday, February 29, more than 30 organizations from Latin America and the Caribbean will speak in front of the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (IACHR), during a public hearing, about a problem that is increasingly affecting to the region: human displacement associated with climate change.
Representing Colombia and with the help of the Latin American Center for Environmental Studies (Celeam), Clarena Fonseca Uriana, leader of Cachaca III, will present her case.
Through a video—since she did not have enough time to obtain a visa to go to Washington—she will explain how coastal erosion in her community has caused five families to abandon their home and how, if the situation worsens, the scenario could be repeated for her and several families.
“The damage we have experienced with the coastal impact is various,” he will explain through the video.
“There are also people at risk of losing their lives.
“Sometimes a ravine, weighing about a thousand tons, almost falls on a fisherman while he is at work.”
And he continues: “All the hope of our culture is going into the sea.”
“We must remember that a public hearing before the IACHR is not a judicial action, nor a lawsuit,” comments Andrés Aristizábal Isaza, director of strategic litigation at Celeam and member of the Hillside Movement.
“So what we hope is that the Court hears this case, as well as those brought by the other 30 organizations to raise the story and discussions about migration, displacement and immobility associated with climate change.”
That is to say, unlike the protection presented before the Council of State, it is not expected that there will be a sentence or ruling, but rather that the Commission will listen to them to generate a precedent that in the region and at a legal and political level it must begin. to talk about this topic.
A young man walks along a beach in the Wayuu Twuliá community, in La Guajira (Colombia). Angie Serna
An Iconic Case of Colombian Coastal Erosion Litigation
In small steps, climate change has been creeping into the world of Colombian law.
“The statement that, we hope, the Council of State will give, is a milestone that will pave the way,” says Aristizábal.
“When we begin to litigate rights related to climate change, what we seek is for the State to generate public policies in this regard, because currently there is no updated legislation.
“We want institutions and policies to not act reactively, but preventively.”
The expert recalls that, in the last six years, according to Unicef data, in Latin America coastal erosion has affected 2.3 million people and that, in the next 30 years, 4.6 million people could be affected alone. due to floods.
In addition, data from the Colombian Ombudsman's Office determined that, in the year 2023, 9,850 people would have had to move in the country due to issues associated with climate change.
For this reason, the Cachaca III case could become a milestone.
“They have managed to make themselves visible,” adds Sierra.
“But in reality there are more than 180 Wayuu communities that are along coastal areas and that are experiencing the same conditions.”
Whatever applies to Cachaca III would be a kind of pilot test for what is to come for all of them.