Published at: 06/03/2025 05:29 PM

(PANORAMA, MARCH 4, 2013)

• On March 3, 2013, the cacique and social fighter Sabino Romero Izarra was assassinated by a gang of assassins, who received multiple bullet wounds while on his way to the elections for chief mayor, together with his wife, Lucía Martínez, who was injured in the attack.
• Several motorized personnel intercepted the vehicle where the indigenous leader was traveling and fired several machine gun bursts at him.
• The crime occurred in the El Tokuko sector, when he was moving from his home located in Chaptaka.
• On multiple occasions, Sabino Romero stood up and faced abuses committed by ranchers, local authorities and landowners.
• Sabino was born in a small village known as Kasmera, located in the Pariries area of the Sierra de Perijá, edo. Zulia.
• As a representative of the Yukpa communities, he acquired from an early age a commitment to fighting for the right to land, the preservation of his ancestral crops and the defense of his ecosystem.
• Their fundamental struggle focused on the plunder carried out by ranchers and landowners, who for many decades took possession of lands that, due to their origin and ownership, did not belong to them. These are territories legitimately inhabited for centuries by the ancient Yukpa people.

CONTEXT:

• In 2008, Commander Hugo Chávez declared: “This government is with the Indians... Between the landowners and the Indians, this government is with the Indians, there is no doubt of any kind (...) we are obliged to protect the weak, who in this case are the indigenous people.”
• This statement was made during the edition of his program Aló Presidente No. 318, held in the La Bombilla neighborhood of Petare, on August 24, 2008.
• On that occasion, he emphasized the problems suffered by the indigenous people who inhabit the Sierra de Perijá, due to the constant harassment of landowners in the area.
• The Commander also stated: “The Yukpa indigenous people must be protected by the government, the Bolivarian National Armed Forces and the State... and the landowners, well, they have to recognize that there is a Revolution here, they have to prove that these lands are really theirs. (...) What I do know is that those lands were occupied by the Yukpa indigenous people for a long time, producing cattle, meat and milk, and they were thrown out of there, and I'm not talking about the conquest by the Spanish, I mean 30 years ago with the support of the police.”
• Following the enactment and entry into force of the Land Law by President Hugo Chávez, it was detected that many ranchers and landowners were obstructing the illegal possession of large tracts of land that were outside the boundaries indicated by their ownership documents. Thus using other people's property and, in this case, harming the original inhabitants who used to live on them ancestrally.
• This demand and the demonstration, in many cases, of the corresponding lack of ownership, was one of the excuses of the right wing to promote the coup d'etat of April 2002.

Mazo News Team