World Bank Meets with AJS-Supported Justice Workers, Community Leaders

(L-R) Community leaders Danilo del Arca and Carminda Pérez, AJS-supported land lawyer Gilda Espinal, and community leader Carlos Murillo in a conference room at the World Bank offices in Tegucigalpa.	(L-R) World Bank representative Geoffrey Bergen talks with Dr. Kurt A.Ver Beek (a member of the boards of both AJS and our Honduran sister organization, ASJ).

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21 Nov 2008 04:59 pm

World Bank Commits to Support Community Leaders Whose Lives Have Been Threatened

By Kenny Castillo

After having become familiar with the problem overwhelming residents of Cofradía, Cortés, World Bank representatives committed before Carminda Pérez, Danilo del Arca and Carlos Murillo, community leaders on whom death threats weigh, to support them in actions aimed at resolving the local crisis.

Tegucigalpa, Honduras – Leaders from the area where two fellow community leaders were murdered in the first weeks of October (a third was murdered in Villanueva) visited the World Bank to request support in resolving the land problem in their place of residence.

The World Bank is an important actor in the land regularization and titling processes run by government throughout the country, because it finances the Property Institute through a credit agreement.

Those gathered at the meeting included a World Bank team headed by Geoffrey Bergen and Reynaldo Vega, Director of Honduras’s Land Administration Program (PATH), who listened attentively to Pérez, Del Arca, and Murillo.

Others in attendance included members of the Asociación para una Sociedad más Justa, known as ASJ (AJS's Honduran sister organization), namely the association’s Vice-President, Kurt Alan Ver Beek, and the Coordinator of the Land Rights Project, lawyer Gilda Espinal.

During his participation, del Arca said, “There are great problems in the regularization process, and that’s why we’re presenting these complaints,” as he showed a document expressing the Property Institute’s poor performance. He also produced a receipt from the Institute dating from two years ago, exactly the length of time that a resident in the area has had to wait for the Property Institute to carry out the simple procedure of a title transfer.

Pérez indicated that Property Institute authorities have deceived them, while Murillo emphasized how, paradoxically, in two years only two government vehicles have passed by his house, while the luxurious cars of false landowners drive by continuously.

Bergen thanked Peréz, del Arca, and Murillo for sharing their stories and expressed that the Bank’s doors will always be open to Cofradía’s leaders. He also maintained that the visit had initiated a new stage of dialogue.

“We will likely be unable to have satisfactory answers to your problems today, but at least we can listen,” said the official.

The World Bank will maintain communication with ASJ through Enrique Pantoja, the World Bank’s Manager at the PATH, with the purpose of revealing the process and achieving objectives.

On December 1, 2008, two World Bank representatives traveled to San Pedro Sula to meet with a wider group of community leaders from Cofradía and other nearby communities. While the World Bank did not outline any specific steps it would take to address the situation in Cofradía, we pray that these meetings will serve as a step forward towards solving these problems.