Complaint to the UN against the construction of a power plant in Guyana

The West Guyana Power Plant (CEOG) project has been contested for years by the inhabitants of Prospérité (or Atopo Wepe), an Amerindian village of the Kali'na ethnic group located two kilometers from the site. They consider the plant too close to homes and ask to find another base for it.

“Referring to the UN is one of the only ways today to make yourself heard,” the secretary general of the Grand Customary Council of the Indigenous Peoples of Guyana, Jean-Philippe Chambrier, told AFP.

The complaint was filed at the request of the village's traditional chief, Roland Sjabere, by the Organization of Indigenous Nations of French Guiana (ONAG) with the support of the International Service for Human Rights (ISHR), an NGO based in Geneva, before the Committee for the Elimination of Racial Discrimination which has no power of constraint on States.

In a press release, the ONAG and the ISHR indicate that they have contacted the UN committee regarding "the progress of the work and the exhaustion of avenues of appeal in the French courts".

“In Guyana, the needs and traditions of indigenous peoples continue to be secondary issues for the authorities,” said Mr. Sjabere, quoted in the press release.

“By persisting with this project in this form and in this location, the French Republic is trampling on our identity and endangering our way of life and the future of our peoples,” he added.

The complaint states that the project is located on land that the inhabitants of Prospérité use for "hunting, fishing and gathering" and denounces its "environmental impact" as well as "the consequences of its implementation on their way of life and their means of subsistence.

"Without delay"

ONAG and ISHR ask the UN committee to take up the matter "without delay" and to order France "to immediately end" the construction project", insisting on the fact that "the inhabitants of the village are not opposed to the project as such but to its location".

Started in November 2022, the work was interrupted for five months, during the rainy season, with CEOG citing “technical and meteorological constraints”.

Protected by a significant deployment of law enforcement due to tensions, workers restarted deforestation operations in mid-August 2023 in this area of ​​western Guyana, in the commune of Mana.

Henry Hausermann, CEOG director general, told AFP that he was not aware of the request being filed with the UN.

“We are working to allow this factory, awaited by the population, to come out of the ground,” he said.

“We took advantage of the good weather to complete the deforestation and today we are in the phase of earthworks and creation of accesses and roads. We will soon begin the installation of solar panels,” he added. Commissioning is planned for 2026.

This photovoltaic plant is intended, ultimately, to supply electricity to 10.000 homes via energy storage technology running on hydrogen.

The project, whose genesis dates back to 2017, brings together for 170 million euros the French investment fund Meridiam (60%), the Société Anonyme de la Raffinerie des Antilles (30%) and Hydrogène de France (10%). %).

The Prospérité village received the support of the League for Human Rights (LDH), but the center has rather a consensus among local elected officials who have mainly spoken in favor of it, Guyana being subject to frequent power cuts .