Tocones is rising!

by Global Ministries | published on Oct 10, 2014

Last Thursday, April 28, Amnesty International was invited by an ecological activist to visit the community of Tocones in Loiza. Historically, Loiza have been a settlement of afro-descendants in Puerto Rico. Tocones is located in one of the best coastal areas in the metropolitan area. From the main road you cannot notice that there is a community there.

While there, we had the opportunity to visit with don Goyo, a seventy years old campesino who has been living in the community all his life, also his mother who is a 100 years young has been all her life a resident of the area. The years living in the area are extremely important for them because these are ancestral lands for the residents of Tocones. Unfortunately, they don’t have lands rights or as is said in Spanish, a titulo, and a deed to prove that the land is theirs. All their lives they have been arrimados, which means that for hundred of years they have planted and tended the land, built their houses and lived there.

We also met, Dona Jesusa, a sixty year old woman that lived in the area all her life. With her savings she built a three bedrooms cement house for her family. Since her house was located right by the beach, the landowner forced her to leave that house which they then destroyed. At the cries of injustice, the state government responded by building wood houses for Dona Jesusa and don Goyo. Both are extremely depressed because they both feel that the temporary houses that they are living in are not theirs.

In the island, the new style of property ownership is a beach condo as a second home; therefore these lands have become priceless. At the present time the community is literally surrounded by four beach condo apartment projects that sell at a minimum of $250,000 each. The only patch of land that has not been turned into a condo is Tocones. The community organized themselves to fight for their right to live on their lands. The landowners have used all kinds of aggression and repression against the community. They want them out, so that they can build another beach condo.

Amnesty International, as an organization, visited the community to learn about their struggle and to try to respond to their claims. From our point of view, their situation is a clear violation of article 22 of the Universal Human Rights Declaration. We offered to train them on learning about their human rights and if necessary to accompany them to the courts.

As a missionary, my promise was to share their struggle with the church at large. The injustice suffered in this community cries out to each of us. It reminded me of Jesus’ words in Mathew 25: 45.

Carmen Alicia Nebot (Ali)

Ali Nebot is a missionary with the Evangelical Council of Puerto Rico. She serves as a program coordinator on human rights issues.