IN STEREO

As we said, the Cerro Rico is heritage, so up until now they are complaining about ‘heritage’. But now they are taking out everything, to get at the silver. Manquiri is the one that is taking it out. No one can stop them. That’s why I say we cannot lose our Association: we are defenders of the Cerro Rico of Potosí. We have a deep history. [In the ‘80s], guards went: palliris. 250 or 350 went. And we used to be at the peak, the whole blockade, some watching out and the others sitting in the mine entrance chewing coca, because it was very cold. The defence of the mountain was miserable for us. Whether we ate or not, we were on the mountain.

It snowed. Now I’m in a vest and everything – in those times, it was all blankets and pins. That’s why we have rheumatism. We were young, too. I was running around from side to side like that – I didn’t get tired. We put the dynamite down and, “Boom!” so that the people heard that we were the palliri women up there, taking the Cerro Rico of Potosí. That’s the thing. Now, the way the agreement is with the cooperatives, they do not allow us to defend it. We have no right to speak, so we are told. The cooperatives haven’t defended it for anyone, not even the miners. But we are like cooperativists too. So as palliris, women cooperativists, it is our job too, to defend the Cerro Rico so that companies don’t take it. – Doña Julia