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Choluteca Declaration
Representatives of the various social and popular organizations from Nicaragua,
El Salvador, Guatemala, and Honduras that met in the city of Choluteca,
Honduras on 22 and 23 June declare that:
1. We form a part of a global solidarity movement, united
in the determination to fight against an economic and political model
that concentrates wealth and generates and spreads poverty and the destruction
of the planet. Diversity in thought combined with unity of action in this
struggle form the basis of our power.
2. We emphatically reject the Free Trade Area of the
Americas (FTAA), Plan Puebla Panama (PPP), Free Trade Agreements (FTAs))
and any other form of annexation disguised under the purported benefits
of free trade, because: It is untrue that they create sustainable and
stable development or better jobs.
· They threaten our peoples’ historical, cultural,
and natural wealth
· They destroy national sovereignty.
· They hinder the process of building the complete democracy to
which our peoples aspire.
· They deprive people of the right to food sovereignty.
· They increase foreign debt and its social costs.
· They increase unfair trade and trade deficits for our people
and our countries.
· They are projects that cede control of our hemisphere to the
large multinational corporations based in the United States, Europe, and
Asia.
3. We base our position on the failures of twenty years
of neoliberalism in Latin America, in addition to the seven years of the
North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), which has produced negative
impacts on the majority of Mexicans, as well as on workers and rural people
in the United States and Canada.
4. We condemn the protectionist policy and the cynicism
of the subsidies for agricultural and industrial production in the United
States and Europe, and more concretely the recently passed U.S. Farm Bill,
in contrast to the policy of complete liberalization of agricultural production
imposed on our countries’ governments.
5. We struggle against a system based on violence and
that favors the interests of capital over people’ needs and aspirations.
6. We believe that the resistance and unity of the various
sectors of our countries is of vital importance in confronting the dangers
of new forms of colonization and exclusion. It is not enough just to protest
against the FTAA; we must build a social movement with proposals.
In light of this situation, we propose:
1. To reject the privatization of public and natural
services, the FTAA, PPP, and FTAs.
2. To fight to change the model of dependence and foreign
debt, and to support the alternative proposals put forth by the World
Social Forum.
3. To build an alternative of Central American and Continental
Union based on the proposals of the Hemispheric Social Alliance and that
gives continuity to the unifying philosophies of Bolivar, Morazan, and
Marti.
4. To reject the presence of foreign troops in the region
and any attempt to remilitarize our society.
5. To reconstruct an economic base in our countries by
means of true incentive and production protection programs.
6. The immediate work is to organize the Central American
people to not elect officials and delegates who are a part of or in the
service of neoliberalism.
7. To fight for the rights and autonomy of the indigenous
people in the context of Convention 169 of the International Labour Organization.
8. Governments should protect, encourage, and finance
the social sector of the economy. We have the resources to achieve high
standards of living for this and future generations.
9. It is criminal to keep instituting policies that do
not protect our consumers and favor the consumption of imported goods.
10. To radically transform the structure of land use,
encouraging agrarian reform, protecting and promoting access to resources
for production, marketing and solidarity both with and between the true
producers of national wealth.
Another Central America is possible.
Choluteca, Honduras, 23 June 2002
Go to www.compasite.org/noticias
Mesa Alternativa Nicaraguense frente la ALCA (MANFA), Nicaragua
Red Sinti Techan, El Salvador
Coordinadora Nacional Indigena y Campesina de Guatemala
Red de Comercializacion Comunitaria Alternativa (Red Comal), Honduras
Bloque Popular de Honduras
Translation by Dan Thomas, The Development GAP
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