It is not an “evil” mining project or a giant dam project that is present in Union Hidalgo’s lands, but a renewable energy project that promises to contribute to green development and a sustainable economy.

Union Hidalgo is a Mexican indigenous community, from the Isthmus of Tehuantepec region in Oaxaca state. Due to this and other wind park projects, its space, in terms of territory and also from a civic space perspective, has been increasingly shrinking.

48% of Oaxaca’s population are indigenous people, and the Isthmus region is one of the areas with the most potential for wind energy in the world. So, the case of Union Hidalgo is not the first, and will most likely not be the last, case of conflicts and shrinking space around renewable energy projects in Mexico.

The key issue with regard to the wind park project of French EDF’s local subsidiary is that the project has been progressing without informing or having previously consulted the affected community at any point. After winning the relevant auctions in October 2016, the company has allegedly already applied for authorisation, submitted a Social Impact Assessment to the authorities, held meetings with the local government and signed individual land leases. 

The lack of prior consultations represents shrinking space for civil society, echoing a trend that the recent study “Tricky Business” about shrinking spaces in natural resource exploitation (including land use) depicts further. The study shows that civil society space does not shrink when activists receive threats, are stigmatised or arrested, as it happens often in Mexico, but instead starts much earlier when those potentially affected by a project are denied participation and consultation. 

Indigenous communities have the fundamental right to be consulted. The right to free, prior and informed consent is established in the Mexican constitution, the UN Declaration of the Rights of Indigenous Peoples and also ILO Convention No. 169, applicable in Mexico. These elements should also be part of a company’s human rights due diligence responsibility. 

Consultations are essential to a people whose history, identity and cultural survival depends on the territory and environment where it settles historically over generations. 

Also, and even from a company perspective, consultations have enormous potentials to resolve conflicts. As the UN Interagency Framework Team for Conflict Prevention puts it, „(w)hile the underlying conflicts between development objectives and community values may generate real tensions, those tensions are far less likely to escalate into violent conflict if those affected can play a decisive role in the decision-making process.“

Can proper consultations be upheld in the case of Union Hidalgo?: While ProDESC – the organisation that supports the community – was still investigating EDF’s lack of transparent plans, and the community was still figuring out how to defend their rights, in September 2017, several earthquakes of up to 8.2-magnitude hit Mexico. Union Hidalgo was badly affected, and still today numerous houses remain destroyed and people lack access to housing, water and food. Reconstruction is lagging behind or not happening at all. Instead, state authorities are now suddenly pushing for a rushed consultation process for EDF’s wind park. 

The community’s worry: the company could offer social projects consisting of reconstruction works – usually, a state responsibility – in exchange for gaining fast approval of the wind park project. People’s urgent needs for safe housing, water and food, combined with the state’s inaction over the last six months, might leave many without much choice than to agree to the wind park project, just to secure help with reconstruction. 

But Union Hidalgo has stepped up to raise its voice. The community filed an OECD complaint at the French National Contact Point (NCP) at the French Ministry of Economic Affairs. Will the French NCP live up to the expectations and actually help resolve the conflict? 

Recently a coalition of French organisations published an Urgent Appeal to the NCP. After years of engaging with the mechanism, their balance is discouraging: The coalition argues that the NCP has rarely offered remedy to the victims and their proposals for improvement remained unheard. To ensure compliance with its mandate and core principles, the coalition suggests the NCP to undertake independent investigations, design a transparent process and timetable, ensure participation of all parties, and follow up on compliance with its recommendations. Ensuring impartiality is particularly relevant in the process against EDF, because the French government holds more than 80% of the company’s shares.

The complainants of Union Hidalgo have offered a real-time laboratory for the NCP to respond to the Urgent Appeal. Now, the NCP has the opportunity to either provide effective remedy for human rights violations or to become complicit in the shrinking of space that Union Hidalgo is experiencing.