Guatemala Squatters Cling to the Soil

For four years, President Alfonso Portillo ignored a growing movement of poor people setting up camps on private property throughout Guatemala.

The situation is now a headache for his successor, Oscar Berger, who took office in January and is trying to deal with court orders that his government clear squatter settlements from more than 150 big farms.

Squatters sometimes resist police raids, arguing that they have nowhere else to live.

The problem made headlines in August when police evicted 600 squatters from a farm in Nueva Linda, about 110 miles southwest of Guatemala City, by setting their shacks on fire and shooting tear gas. A melee erupted that resulted in the deaths of eight farmers and four officers.

The squatters were back within three weeks and seek compensation from the government. It has paid $57,000 so far -- $2,500 to each of eight families that had a relative killed, and the rest for lost crops and property.

The government’s human rights ombudsman issued an Oct. 13 report accusing police of unjustified homicide and chided authorities for not doing enough to prevent the violence. The report has led Congress and prosecutors to open investigations.

Land disputes are common throughout Latin America, where titles are often unclear and where the poor and landless rarely have the resources to acquire living space.

In Guatemala, about 70% of the rural population is fighting over land ownership, says Walter Pop, an analyst for an advocacy group dedicated to farmer and Indian rights.

Squatters who set up the small, northern mountain communities of Chichicaste, Covandonga and Sepacay, all within a few miles of each other, say they have few other options.

In May, police evicted about 400 people from the settlements. But the squatters, who fled when they saw the nearly 300 officers arriving, simply returned and rebuilt after the raid.

Many squatters think that they have a right to the land after spending a lifetime living on it.

In San Juan Chamelco, 130 miles northeast of Guatemala City, Gilda de Mo was recently kicked off land where she had spent all of her 21 years. “My dad is 54, and he was born there,” she said. “Nobody who lived there has anywhere else to go.”

Since being evicted, she and her husband and two children have been living in a small shack without drinkable water or electricity, which they rent for $8 a month. She earns $5 a day sorting the spice cardamom and her husband is a makes $150 a month as a security guard.

Carlos Zuniga, director of the Agricultural Chamber, an association that represents most of Guatemala’s big farmers, says the problem stems from the lack of economic development.

“Movements that say they are looking for a solution to agrarian conflict insist they need land to produce corn and beans.... It would be better to negotiate a change in crops so that they can have a chance at exporting and making money,” Zuniga said.