Brigitte García was a very brave Human Rights Defender

 

                         

Above all else, Brigitte Garcia devoted her time as the Mayor of San Vicente to defend the inalienable human rights of residents to affordable, sufficient, safe water.

In a nation where one out of three children are exposed to contaminated water and are malnourished, Brigitte sought concrete solutions to the drought conditions that they suffer.

Brigitte challenged the water mafia who are sucking the poor dry.

She demanded that illegal connections to the public water supply were found and stopped. She called a state of emergency in the canton for the lack of water provision. She arranged for water to be delivered from the Prefecture of Manabí, and then…

She signed contracts with The Development Bank to construct two new water plants, in Canoa and San Vicente – giving those communities independence from the water company that violate their human rights every day (through incompetence, whether deliberate or otherwise.) That was on the 21st of March.

And days later she was murdered.

She was a Human Rights defender from the village of Canoa – where residents are paralyzed daily for lack of water, forced to constantly beg for private delivery & forced to pay extortionate prices for that delivery.

Canoa is a community terrorized into a silent fear.

Death threats have been constant against individuals campaigning for their rights to water – and those death threats were (conspicuously) not investigated.

Luis Ayala, the main water rights activist in Canoa is now in Humanitarian Protection (courtesy of Frontline defenders) after attacks against him resulted in no protection and no process of justice.

After an attempt to kill him, and a long wait, he was finally helped to escape.

But there is no protection for those activists who remain.

Brigitte Garcia, despite her extraordinary courage standing up to the systemic corruption of water exploitation, had no protection.

Why?

Because the agents of the state - who should have been protecting her - were too busy turning a blind eye.

President Daniel Noboa’s response to the assassination of Brigitte Garcia is on target.

He is in a perfect situation to demonstrate the validity of his civil war against organised crime now. He can militarize the public water service that “fails” to serve five cantons, put in the required pumps to get it working and prove that the solution simply required action.

The President has stated that Brigitte’s murder:

“…gives us an alert and clear information that narcoterrorism exists within public institutions and narcoterrorism exists among public officials. Which we are cleaning up, but soon that will come to light..."

Those are words. To honour the brave and extraordinary life of Brigitte Garcia and the people she defended – Ecuador’s President needs to support those words with actions.

Ecuadorian Lives Matter offer our deep condolence to Brigitte’s family, friends and colleagues who now grieve the loss of such a bright, brave and beautiful woman - and also fear for their own lives. 

Brigitte, 27, was from the parish of Canoa, a community that has suffered a succession of troubles, atrocious Human Rights violations and have been systemically neglected by previous local and national governments.