Chiapas: Protest in Defense of Water and Life in San Cristobal de Las Casas

@Chiapas Paralelo

On March 18th, in the framework of World Water Day, residents, activists and civil society organizations protested in the city of San Cristobal de Las Casas in defense of water and life.

In a statement they said that “Mexico faces serious problems and challenges due to the lack of availability and quality of water for human consumption. The severe drought that is shaking us has multiple interconnected causes: climate change, deforestation, population growth, the lack of a culture of water care, the implementation of public policies that respond to the laws of the globalized market, a model of water management that gives rise to over-exploitation, hoarding, contamination, dispossession and privatization of the vital liquid.”

For this reason, they asked to stop the granting of concessions to large corporations and companies with extractive activities by the National Water Commission (CONAGUA).

In the case of San CristObal de las Casas in particular, the protesters reported that “FEMSA has two concessions that allow it to extract 481,982 m3 annually in two wells approximately 180 meters deep, that is, one million 320 thousand liters per day (… ) This year 2024, FEMSA-Coca Cola is seeking certification from the Alliance for Water Stewardship (AWS), for sustainable water management and for employing strategies and actions to return the water it extracts to the basin.”

“Meanwhile ranches, communities and neighborhoods do not have access to quality water, the water is contaminated by fecal coliforms, the service provided by the municipal system works in non-daily batches. This has serious effects on the city’s hospitals and schools, where girls and boys do not have the minimum health services; and women’s domestic work increases. In addition, FEMSA has impacts on the environment with its plastic bottles; it has neo-colonized the cultures of the region and exercises ideological interference through its marketing in the dietary practices of the population,” they also denounced.

For more information in Spanish:

En SCLC colectivos protestan contra la certificación de Femsa Coca Cola (NVI Noticias, 16 de marzo de 2024)

Quieren frenar el despojo de agua por multinacional (Cuarto Poder, 17 de marzo de 2024)

FEMSA extrae un millón de litros diarios de San Cristóbal de las Casas (Chiapas Paralelo, 17 de marzo de 2024)

For more information from SIPAZ: