Determining Fisher Peoples Sovereignty: Reclaiming Panama for Indigenous Fishers and Our Victories for Customary Governance

We have witnessed powerful mobilisation across continents — from national meetings and continental fora in Africa and Asia Pacific, to relentless social media action, the global campaign on Panama, our report launch on rising seas, our all-out campaign around COP-30 at Belém, and so much more!

Now, as we move toward International Human Rights Day (10 December) — the closing moment of a campaign that began on 5 November (the first-ever International Fisherwomen’s Day) and travelled through World Fisher Peoples’ Day (21 November)

At this final stretch, we are coming together to celebrate, to affirm our rights, and to continue resisting

As the Five-Week Campaign draws to an end, we pause — not to conclude, but to refuse the growing political project that seeks to privatise oceans and erase customary rights. So we ask: do you know what’s unfolding in Panama, and in coastal communities worldwide resisting ocean privatisation and erasure of customary rights? Victories have emerged through struggle. This webinar is a celebration and a call to resist.

Join us- December 12th at 3:00 PM CET / 7:30 PM IST / 8:00 AM Belize for a timely conversation about fisher peoples’ sovereignty

We are at a pivot point with the effects of climate change, and fisher peoples are at the frontlines of enduring the consequences. Not only are they enduring rising tides and natural disasters but their human and customary rights are being eroded by governments that want to take their territories away.
We understand that governments want these territories because they have been well kept and preserved by the people that depend on those resources the most. We must protect those people and defy any notion that they are not the rightful caretakers of their ancestral territories.

We have seen this first-hand through our Indigenous comrades in Panama who are in a battle with their government for their right to govern their ancestral island of Escudo de Veraguas, also called Degö island. Every local, national, and international law supports the Ngäbe Buglé peoples rights to their ancestral fishing grounds, yet this year the Ministry of the Environment of Panama, headed by Juan Carlos Navarro has decided to attack those rights by prohibiting subsistence fishing, occupying the island with police, confiscating fishing equipment used for ancestral fishing, and tearing down houses of Indigenous residents unannounced.

This November, it all came to a head with two meetings back to back, where Ngäbe Buglé fishers confronted their government with the backing of international guests like Carlos Duarte, Chair of UNDROP. This webinar will address this and other cases of dispossession that go against international law and basic human rights.

Opening Remarks

• Shalmali Guttal, Senior Analyst, Focus on the Global South, and member of the Working Group on UNDROP

Moderator

• Christiana Saiti, Indigenous Fisherwoman with the Emolo Forum in Kenya

Speakers reflect fishers from various regions:

• Panama:
  Alfonso Simón Raylan, Ngäbe Buglé, President of SITRAMAR (Union of Sea Workers)
  and Astriyaneth Yasmin Santo Baker, Ngäbe Buglé, Community Seafood Processer

• North America/Alaska:
  Melanie Brown, Yup’ik and Inupiaq Fisherwoman, Board Member of the NAMA (North American Marine Alliance)

• Latin America & Caribbean (Ecuador):
  Lider Gongora, C-CONEDM (Coordinadora Nacional Para la Defensa del Manglar)

• Africa (Uganda):
  Seremos Kamuturaki – Uganda Fisheries and Fishing community organisation(UFFCA)

• Palestine:
  Sa’ad Ziada- Union of Agricultural Work Committees – UAWC

• Asia (Indonesia):
  Masnu’ah- heads the PPNI Indonesia and is CC Member of WFFP, representing Asia Pacific region

Key Respondents and International Spokespeople

• Mary Lawlor, UN Special Rapporteur on Human Rights Defenders

• Carlos Duarte, Chair-Rapporteur, Working Group on UNDROP

• Herman Kumara, General Secretary, WFFP (World Forum of Fisher Peoples)

Organised by WFFP and Focus, and Facilitated by PARC-I
5WC webinar series