Let Yasuní live – In a first, Ecuadorians to vote on potential oil drilling ban in Amazon

Winner of the Goldman Environmental Prize – awarded annually to grassroots environmental activists – Nemonte Nenquimo recently wrote an op-ed piece for The Guardian, highlighting how her country could be the first to limit fossil fuel extraction through direct democracy.

The people of Ecuador in South America will vote in a referendum on Sunday whether or not to destroy their home. Nenquimo wrote on Yasuní – one of the most biodiverse places on Earth and home to the last two indigenous people living in voluntary isolation in the country.

An area of one million hectares, Yasuní has more tree species in a single hectare than across Canada and the US combined. But the oil industry hopes to burn the area and has already begun in fact, with the Ishpingo-Tambococha-Tiputini project on the eastern edge of the national park.

Crucial Vote After A Cowardly Murder Of Presidential Candidate

Some Ecuadorians fought for a decade to make this referendum happen. Environmentalists gathered more than 750,000 signatures to put the decision to protect the fragile environment to a vote. The poll was set for August 20, the same day as the first round of presidential election.

The question voters will answer is: “Do you agree with the Ecuadorian government keeping the ITT, known as Block 43, crude oil indefinitely in the subsoil?” While multiple recent polls have showed the yes vote leading, they were conducted before a cowardly murder.

Presidential candidate Fernando Villavicencio was killed on August 9 while leaving a campaign event. The incident sent shockwaves through Ecuador, with President Guillermo Lasso announcing a state of emergency and granting the military control over public security.

World Badly Needs Examples Of Political Action

But Nenquimo believes the violence that has been making lives of Ecuadorians difficult for the past five years will not be eliminated by sending more armed men into the streets. So much is at stake on Sunday, when people will vote on the “possibility of limiting greed and plunder”.

With the dangers of the climate crisis more pronounced than ever, the world is in dire need of examples of political action. While the opposition will argue that oil drilling brings jobs, salaries, development and prosperity, this is a lie, the Goldman Environmental Prize awardee stressed.