Godofredo’s alive – 20 years later
A tribute to the agricultural leader and martyr of Tambograndé Issue.
On March 31st, 2001, agronomic engineer Godofredo García Baca was murdered near his estate in Somate Bajo, Piura, Peru. A guy was punished by this crime, but despite that, the motivation of the fact and the people who ordered that have not clarified up to date.
He
born at a home dedicated to agriculture in Chulucanas, in 1936. His school-boy
years happened between that city and Piura, but his favorite place was the
countryside. That’s why he entered La Molina National
Agrarian University in Lima, where he studied Agronomy, and specialized
in enthomology. He started a career as a teacher and got married to Elva Pérez.
He
was just one year as a teacher when he decided to return to Piura in 1964 for
settling down as a settler at San Lorenzo Valley. His property was
located in Somate Bajo, Sullana, in the northwestern edge of the colonization,
where he acquired 80 hectares. The assignation was via a public call in the
most ambitious agricultural project of that time. In that place, Mr García
developed the diversified unit of crops
and breedings. This means associating diverse crops complemented with
breedings in one only physical space, where they share the water, the nutrients, and even the plagues.
He
also purchased a house in Piura City. He had two sons –Godofredo and Ulises—and
three daughters –Dina, Elva, and Rossana. They all are professionals who work within
the science, the art, the urbanism, and the social activism inclusive. In 1993,
he wan the San Luis Prize to the Nature Conservation with his sons Godofredo
and Ulises because of his contribution, harmonizing the water and applying the
models he experienced with at his estate.
In
1998, he stopped the extractive activities that the contractor Energoprojeckt
did not caring the environment just to the east of his property, in Somatillo
Hill, also known as La Chancadora. His ‘weapons’ were maps, photographs, and
documents. When blasted the conflic of the Tambograndé’s pretended mining
exploitation, in San Lorenzo Valley’s southern border (1999), Godofredo turned
a tenacious opponent, he knew to capitalize his skill to warn everybody about
what it was going to happen, and he was the first one to give the alert call.
Mr
García summarized the reasons why the mining project was not to be accepted in
four ones:
- Disposal of private property – The lands where the
valley is settled over where bought by its settlers through free sales
processes between 1962 and 1965, what could attempt against the Peru’s
Constitution itself (article 70th). Ultimately, the agriculture has more public need criteria than mining because it satisfies immediately the needs
of community.
- It puts the cattle activity that sustains
the zone in danger – According to the Constitution (Article 88th),
the State preferently supports the agricultural development and guarantees the
property.
- Disappearing of the vegetal cover (formed
by forest and crop lands) – Because of its progressive death caused by the
building or operation of open pits despite the State is forced to protect the biodiversity (Constitution, article
68th, developed by Fidel Torres in 2000). Obviously,
the fauna and human populations will be affected without remedy.
- Deterioration of air & water quality due to the
contamination with explosives, gases, as well as the noise and the vibrations,
in a 60-km area around the open pit, what implies to affect to cities of
Chulucanas, Las Lomas, Sullana-bellavista, and Piura-Castilla, plus hundreds of
towns located in between.
Godofredo
García Baca was assasinated by a gunshot on March 31st, 2001, just 1
km away his property in Somate Bajo. His murderer was jailed but causes of the
crime were never revealed. It’s a belief of his followers that interests in
favor of mining ended his life. The company which Godofredo fought against
became to get out the country in 2005, and today it develops activities in
Central Turkey. The documentary Tambogrande – Mangos, Mining, Murder (2007) is inspired on
his struggle.
Source: FACTORTIERRAArchive with a
contribution of Piura Vida y AgroGodofredo García Baca.
Saturday,
March 31st, 2001 – a timeline
- 7:00 – Godofredo García and his son Ulises departured Piura City to the family’s estate in Somate Bajo, Sullana, 70 km away. They went on their own pick-up. The previousnight, it have rained too heavy and the nearby ways to the property were of dry clay. The rain turned it mud, so Ulises, who drove the pick-up, had to go slow down. As it’s usual to pay the wworkers on Saturday, both carried approximately 200 dollars.
- 8:00 – Both arrive to Somate Bajo Areaand go in one of the lanes.
- 8:05 – They cross by Asdrúbal Zapata Atocha who rode a bike in the opposite sense.
- 8:15 – Ulises realizes there is litter blocking the lane. He reduces the speed purposed to pick down for removing the obstacle. Just in that moment, a hooded folk gets out amid some bushes, rises a stir and shoots against Godofredo García, targeting straight on his heart. The place chosen for the ambush used to stay alone and full of huge vegetation.
- 8:20 – After verifying that Godofredo was unconscious asking, not much interested, for the money of payment, the hooded orders to put him on the hopper, pick on the co-driver seat, and aiming the gun to Ulises, forces to drive toward Somatillo Hill.
- 8:25 – At García Estate’s entrance, located 1 km away the crime scene, the workers see the pick-up to pass fastly but they don’t realize what happens although they wonder the fact.
- 8:30 – When gotten the hill’s base, the hooded picks down the pick-up and runs away a wild land managed by García Family. Seen free of threats, Ulises tries to revive his father, unsuccessfully.
- 8:35
– Ulises comes back his property, notifies the fact, assigns a worker to go
with him, and drive fast on his way to Sullana City, 30 km away.
Paralelly, the hooded leaves out his hiding place and unhoods his face. A
shepperd girl, who was 13 years old that time, and had seen the whole deploy,
realizes it’s about Meléndez Zapata Atocha, 22 years old that time, who runs
away one of the hill’s slopes in a hurry.
- 8:45 – On his run to his house, located just to the south of García Estate, other two persons look at him.
- 9:15 – Ulises and the worker with Godofredo get to Sullana Hospital’s emergency room. He’s attended late. When they examine him at least, realize he’s dead. The son of the leader assures that when he drove to Sullana, he had the impression his father still breathed.
- 9:45 – After warning the family from Sullana, Ulises reports the fact to Radio Cutivalú in Piura. At the same time, Meléndez, in Somate Services Center, calls to a cellphone at La Libertad Department.
- 10:00 – factortierra News, called factortierra-LI at that time, has the first report.
There
are many prior facts to the crime’s day that left away, including two sucesive
visits of personel allegedly linked to Minas Buenaventura but based in Las
Lomas, Piura. Both visits were badly had by Godofredo, en he rejected the
miners almost jostling in the second one
10
years later, a Las Lomas-based mining company –not Buenaventura—gets involved
in a multiple crime but the same modus
operandi. According to Peruvian officials, the company is over than 15
years of operations.
Currently,
the García Property, that was seized due to ddebts, has been taken by the
littlest mining. The hill, so much successfully defended by Godofredo, is the
main deposit. The littlest mining has been involved in many assaults and
murders with the same system that García was killed. None has been solved.
Meléndez
Zapata was punished with 30 years in prison because of assault with consequent
death, that he keeps in Rio Seco Prison, Piura. He participated in a riot
opposing to be transferred to a bigger security prison in Picsi, Lambayequé.
Including the testimony of the female ocassional eyewitness, Ulises had the
perception it was about Zapata because of his light eyes those he could see
through the hood, plus his height and athletic look. Zapata didn’t recognize to
shoot against Godofredo, he neither revealed who ordered the crime.
Source: FACTORTIERRA Archives./Sucesión Godofredo García Baca.
Legacy – a reference
The
agronomical engineer Godofredo García Baca is one of the heroes and martyrs of
the Tambograndé Issue. He knew to give deep
reasons in favor of the local agriculture with too much simplicity that a
non-educated person could understand him, and with too much competence that a
scientific could difficultely debunk him. Such a skill was not a gamble –
Godofredo studied much and worked hard to go learning everyday. So, he could
transmit that knowledge to his people owing nothing in return.
That
didn’t reduce to his own career but he added other knowledge that enriched his
reasons, making them hard and undebunkable. Another remarkable aspect is his
perseverance – he turned a sa sandy land into a fertile and green land. He
didn’t make it suddenly but he took years. The consequence of his effort was
paid double – it was economically profitable and he had the satisfaction to
preserve the land to continue growing.
He
didn’t accept the injustice. He didn’t stopped to criticize it but he fouth
them straight with pure knowledge and science. So, he could sstop a contractor
that was damaging a nearby hill to his estate, and that was harming the
environment and many of his neighbors inside it. He never proposed the violence
as a wayout and he ever refused it. But maybe, the most permanent remembrance
is his sympathy. His mood was kind and simple. He joked on his friends, and he
was the first in work hard to the top at the time to work for success.
So,
his death shut up his voice but not his work. And the defense guidelines of the
environmental issues systematized by him continue to be used as a scientific,
economic, and social basis applicable everywhere in the world. The lesson he
leaves us is that investing in knowledge is rather advantageous than investing
in the material, that spends through the time and lose value. Not the first one
– as the time passes by, it makes us invincible.
Based in testimonials and opinions of
Ulises García, Julio Castro, Luís Ginocchio,
Francisco Ojeda, Stephanie Boyd, Margarita Rosa Vega, Marlene Castillo y
Liliana Alzamora.
© 2010-2021 Asociación Civil Factor Tierra.
All Rights Reserved. The photograph featured on this entry is © 2000 Stephanie
Boyd.
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