Indian Creek Villagers Say Away with M.L.A.

Villagers of Indian Creek find themselves in the middle of a legal battle with the Maya Leaders Alliance and the Toledo Alcaldes’ Association. The underlying cause is that they’re stuck between a C.C.J. ruling that binds them to tradition and the government system that allows them to develop. Today, the village council held a meeting to say that they reject the legal steps that the M.L.A. has taken to reverse their election of an alcalde and deputy alcalde last November and to reinstate the previous village officials who served in those capacities prior to then. Village Councilor Anselmo Cholom said the reason they chose new alcalde leaders was because the previous ones stuck to the doctrine of the M.L.A., which impedes development in their village.

 

Anselmo Cholom, Member, Indian Creek Village Council

“The people that are leading the Maya people are dividing us in a way where they did not respect the decision of the community that happens at the community center. That’s what we want to [talk] about. And then to see that tradition that we’re practicing – when I am a Mayan person, I practice traditions. That doesn’t mean that I cannot get development. That doesn’t mean that I cannot get a concrete building and stay within a thatch building. It doesn’t keep me away from advancing. That’s basically what I’m talking about.”

 

Marion Ali

“But it’s not that you want to detach or divorce yourselves from the communal land system that has been in a part of the tradition for decades, centuries?”

 

Anselmo Cholom

“Yes, but if it is that the Maya leaders don’t leave the community in Indian Creek, then what is the sense that we practice, that we are there? What is the sense if we don’t want to – if they don’t want to allow us for development? Because that’s what basically the previous Alcalde was doing from not having development. So what is the sense to keep stuck in something that we don’t want to move away? We have to give up. We have to give up on that. We cannot being slave. We have to get out of that and if we have to get out of a communal system because of that, then we have to change.”