Neighbors have staged protests for several days in the Palajunoj Valley, they oppose the land use plan. (Free Press Photo: Mynor Toc)
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Around midnight on Saturday, March 26, the residents of 10 communities in the Palajunoj Valley agreed to unblock the road that leads to the municipal garbage dump, in the departmental capital of Quetzaltenango, lAfter the commune agreed to two of the three demands raised by the neighbors.
However, the problems could continue since the inhabitants of these communities decided that they will allow the passage of 6 to 18 hours and only one truck every hour. In addition, they still do not allow the passage of trucks that extract construction materials in the mountains of the place..
This means that a total of 12 trucks can enter the landfill to deposit their waste in that period and at that rate, when Xela generates approximately 50 truckloads of garbage a day, according to municipal authorities.
By accessing the unblocking of the route that leads to the municipal landfill, the residents avoided being evicted by the security forces, as had already been anticipated.
However, it is uncertain whether in the coming days they will actually adopt the same measures, since the agreement they reached on Saturday at midnight does not include their main demand, which is annul the territorial ordering plan (POT) only for the 10 communities of the Valley.
For now, the municipal authorities agreed to two of the three requests raised by the neighbors. In the first place, the installation of a dialogue table to analyze the second request, which is the generation of a POT different from the one that has generated discord, and that it be exclusive for the 10 communities of the Palajunoj Valley.
The community members oppose the POT that has been in force since 2017, due to the “high” tax charges contained in this, and from that account they demand that the commune repeal the project. They assure that this municipal plan is not adapted to the rural reality of the municipality and that it would affect the economy of the families of those communities.
In this sense, they have proposed that the fines and fees contained in the agreement remain in force for the urban population. But the commune affirms that constitutionally they cannot accede to that request.
It is expected that this week the residents will arrive again at the Municipality of Quetzaltenango in search of reaching agreements. For now, authorities said, the waste has also been taken to landfills in other municipalities such as Colomba and Coatepeque.
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