THERE ARE IRREGULARITIES BEFORE STARTING
Alexandra Almeida (Ecological Action). January 2010
With an unprecedented decision, the Government has begun the search for deposits on the Ecuadorian coast. This process has been plagued by irregularities since its beginning and is already becoming a serious threat to the population in certain sectors.
A silent contract, previously inviting the presentation of offers, in December 2008, Petroproducción, a subsidiary of Petroecuador, signed a contract for almost USD 57 million with the Chinese company SINOPEC to carry out 2D seismic exploration on the Ecuadorian coast. Both the tender and the signing of this contract were carried out without any publicity, it was not picked up by any media. Environmental Studies. “A quickie”._ The first requirement to execute a project of this nature is to obtain the environmental license granted by the Ministry of the Environment. The first step was to request a certificate of intersection which was delivered in November 2008. This determines that the project intersects with the National System of Protected Areas, Protective Forests and State Forest Heritage. According to the current Constitution (art. 407), extractive activity of non-renewable resources in protected areas is prohibited. This means that seismic exploration cannot be carried out in the areas included in the National System of Protected Areas, since it is the first phase of oil exploitation. There is also another irregularity in the preparation of the Environmental Impact Studies. The Terms of Reference were approved on 04/12/2009. Petroproducción presented these Environmental Studies on May 22 of the same year. That is, the company carried out these studies in the record time of 1 month and 10 days. It must be clarified that the project covers 6 provinces: Esmeraldas, Manabí, Guayas, Santa Elena, El Oro and Los Ríos and that to carry out these studies it is necessary: 1. to have the terms of reference approved and then to carry out field work, data collection, bibliographic research and preparation of reports. This must be why the inhabitants of the province of Esmeraldas stated that no one ever came to the area where their properties are located and where the seismic lines were going to pass to carry out a field study or to survey the people.
Prior Consultation, Neither prior nor consultation.- Another requirement that must be met before starting a project is what was previously called prior consultation and which, due to a decree issued on April 22, 2008, is now called the Social Participation process. This decree was issued when the New Constitution was being drafted and although its content is completely unconstitutional, the different Government bodies and companies continue to use it.
This consultation, in this case, took two months. Once again, in record time, it is confirmed that the participation process has been carried out with the population located in the project area, that is, in the 6 coastal provinces.
Once again, the population settled in the area of influence claims that they were never consulted, nor was any participation process carried out. They say that no one approached them to inform them about what was intended to be done in the area, or what the seismic exploration consisted of.
This violates the provisions of Article 398 of the current Constitution: “Any state decision or authorization that may affect the environment must be consulted with the community, which will be fully and promptly informed.”
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