Indigenous Amazonian Nɨpodɨmakɨ (Uitoto) call on governments and peoples worldwide to respect Mother Earth

See video messages below

The Nɨpodɨmakɨ people of the Amazonian Middle Caquetá region of lowland Colombia have sent messages to national leaders and the world community urging genuine respect for Mother Earth.  

In messages sent to states at COP26 in November 2021, the elders forewarn that if world leaders and governments do not take effective actions to curb climate change and stop destruction of natural forests, and if the big companies do not stop extracting fossil fuels, this current pandemic is just the beginning. They foresee something much bigger coming. They advise that they can already sense spiritually that it is going to be much bigger and much more harmful for all peoples. To avert more global sickness and unabated climate change, they counsel governments, business and everyone to tell the truth, act in good faith and stop touching Mother Earth without prior permission and without respect.  

 

“The lies and empty words of States and companies will bring more illnesses…If the laws of the origin of Life are not respected, major changes will come. The waters and rivers will dry up. Forests will become deserts and turn to stoney, sterile ground. This human generation will come to an end and other life forms will occupy the Earth.” 

 

In their message sent by an envoy and Nɨpodɨmakɨ leader attending COP26 via public talks in the Indigenous Peoples’ Pavilion and the Centre for Human Ecology (CHE) in Glasgow, the Amazonian elders explain that rampant and thoughtless extraction of minerals, oil, gas and conversion of tropical forests to industrial farming is causing rising fever, sickness and overheating of the Earth. According to their own customary law and beliefs, the fever must be cooled through their own rituals and proper conduct, and by actions taken by nation states and their governments to change extractivist thinking and recuperate values to show reverence for the divine Mother that sustains all life. 

Alongside the elders’ message, other community members make a direct plea via video message for international solidarity with the Nɨpodɨmakɨ people to sustain territories of life together with neighbouring Nonuya, Andoque and Muinane peoples who self-identify as the Peoples of the Centre and grandchildren of the navel of the world, who share cultural affinities in their traditional use of sweet manioc, tobacco and coca. They urge all indigenous peoples worldwide to unite thought and actions to change the thinking and conduct of states and people across the world. 

To view the elders message and healing invocation, see video here (with English subtitles)

<drupal-media data-align="center" data-embed-button="media_video" data-entity-embed-display="view_mode:media.field" data-entity-type="media" data-entity-uuid="4c27dd38-7784-4e00-9f8a-5003cb186414"></drupal-media>

To hear the communication from Nɨpodɨmakɨ women, youths and community members, view video message here (with English subtitles)

<drupal-media data-align="center" data-embed-button="media_video" data-entity-embed-display="view_mode:media.field" data-entity-type="media" data-entity-uuid="4ae0540b-b4f2-4f5e-b2e6-2c15688e3151"></drupal-media>