Panama
Faced with rising waters, the natives flee their island
It is the smallest island off the coast of Panama. A thousand gunas are piled up there in a very dangerous condition. The inevitable rise in sea level will force them to settle on dry land.
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With rising waters, Corti Chuktubu Island could disappear by 2050.
AFP
Seen from the sky, it is a tangle of red, blue and gray roofs, between which you can make out dirt alleys and, here and there, a few rare trees. All around the sea. Garti Chugtubu is one of the 365 islands of the indigenous Comarca Guna Yala Archipelago, northwest of Panama. About fifty, 50 centimeters to one meter above sea level, are inhabited. And rising sea levels are forcing people to move inland.
Because some of these islands are as small as Karti Chuktubu, the size of five football fields. Its people live from fishing, tourism and manufacturing, on land, from cassava and bananas. Living conditions there are dire: no drinking water, no sanitation, intermittent electricity.
Water is collected on the mainland, either directly from rivers or purchased from stores. Electricity comes from a public generator that only works for a few hours at night. Some have personal generators or solar panels. Simple cabins placed at the end of a pontoon serve as toilets.
“We think of our children”
The floor of the dwellings is earth, walls and roofs are made of wood or sheet metal. Above that, the sea continues to rise. “We noticed that the tide was rising,” says Magdalena Martinez, a 73-year-old retired teacher who weaves a traditional garment at the family home. “We think we’re going to sink, and we know it’s going to happen, years from now, but we’re thinking about our children, and we have to find something where they can live in peace.”
“I want to leave quickly because I know we will have electricity 24 hours a day, fans, air conditioning…”
Braulio Navarro is a teacher at Cordy Chuktubu Primary School
The government and the tribal community have been working for more than ten years on a plan to resettle 300 families on the mainland. Added to the problem of “overpopulation” is the problem of “rising water,” underscores Marcos Suira, an official at Panama’s Ministry of Housing.
Cardi Chuktubu will disappear by 2050
“As a direct result of sea-level rise, climate change, almost all islands will be abandoned by the end of the century,” promises scientist Steven Patton of the Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute (based in Panama). “Every month at high tide some of the lower islands are flooded,” he notes. According to the government, Karti Suktubu will disappear after 2050.
The rainy season further aggravates the situation. “At that time the island almost floats, floods occur and it affects us,” complains Bralio Navarro, a teacher at the islet’s primary school. A 62-year-old man is preparing to move to the mainland with his family. “I want to leave quickly because I know we will have 24-hour electricity, fans, air conditioning. It will be a great benefit to my family,” he said.
300 families will be relocated in early 2024, not far from their former island, on 22 hectares of land reclaimed from the forest. Each family has a plot of 300 m², the 49 m² houses have two bedrooms, a bathroom, a dining room and a kitchen, as well as drinking water and electricity. They can expand their house and set up a vegetable garden. A school will be built.
“We’re happy,” says Nelson Morgan, the community’s highest-ranking native official. Magdalena Martínez dreams of a home where she can “live with dignity,” although she knows she will lose the island. “I’m happy, but also nostalgic. Because I learned to live on the island, I leave a lot of dreams and tears there.
(AFP)
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