National Government endorses the destruction of Bruno stream, according to communities of La Guajira

Despite the decision of the Constitutional Court SU-698 of 2017, which protects the fundamental rights to water, food security and health, in the face of the threat of violation caused by the project to partially modify the Bruno stream by the company Carbones del Cerrejón Limited, institutions of the National Government announced its decision to endorse the final report on the deviation of the natural channel located between the municipal boundaries of Albania and Maicao south of La Guajira.

According to the communication sent by e-mail to the applicants of this process, on 6 April by the official Andrea Corzo Álvarez, director of Sectoral and Urban Environmental Affairs of the Ministry of the Environment, with this final version of the study, the Inter-Institutional Technical Board is expected to satisfy the purpose of the judgment of the court.

And the fact is that the 2017 ruling ordered the creation of such a round table to carry out a technical study that provides an informed response, in order to assess the environmental viability of the stream diversion. “Sufficient spaces for participation must be opened up to representatives of the participating communities, as well as to the institutions and technical staff involved in the proceedings,” the Court stated in its judgment.

The José Alvear Restrepo Lawyers' Collective (Cajar) denounced that the effective participation of the Wayuu shareholding communities of Paradero and La Gran Parada was not considered in this round table. “This decision is contained in a study with technical and scientific inadequacies, rigged, without rigor and with predominant information from the foreign company Carbones del Cerrejón.”

According to the lawsuit filed, the transnational company's plan is to dynamite a section of the stream's natural channel to expand coal mining. In 2020, the Comptroller's Office filed with the monitoring court, a compliance audit report on environmental aspects related to the diversion of Bruno stream.

According to the findings, the report obtained a final rating of inefficient, the Public Prosecutor's Office found a total of 14 administrative findings of which seven “have a possible disciplinary connotation”. In addition, he pointed out that these deficiencies have an impact on compliance with the Constitutional Court's ruling.

In addition, in 2017, according to the complainants, the company accelerated the work to divert the stream, while the judicial process was ongoing before the Constitutional Court and they were obliged to restore the passage of surface waters from Bruno stream to its natural channel. “The adoption of this provisional measure must be resolved within thirty 30 days of the notification of this judgment.”

Among the environmental reasons given by the Court for the determination of the judgment are the consequences of intervening a tropical dry forest, the effects of climate change and global warming in the department of La Guajira, the magnitude of extractive interventions carried out in the department and the effects of the processes that the Cerrejón has historically carried out on bodies of water.

In its communication, El Cajar states that, “in the preparation of this study, public entities openly disobeyed the guidelines and criteria contained in the judgment and dedicated themselves exclusively to endorsing the benefits of the artificial channel.”

Carbones del Cerrejón Limited stated that, “five years after the project to modify the new channel began, it has become a 24-kilometer biodiversity corridor that runs between the Montes de Oca forest reserve and the Ranchería river. In addition to maintaining its water flow and housing hundreds of species, it has allowed the growth of more than 12,000 trees, 2,000 of which have been born naturally,” they said in a statement.

However, communities have reported that after the stream was diverted, its flow has been decreasing significantly, until it almost disappeared in dry seasons. “The company continued to advertise an artificial channel with which there is no spiritual connection and whose access is restricted by private security personnel from the company and the Army,” they reported.

For their part, environmentalists have pointed out that La Guajira is a territory that is highly vulnerable to the climate crisis, with a recognized and acute humanitarian crisis due to water and food shortages. The Bruno stream is the freshwater aquifer that feeds it.

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