Affected People

In November 2003, more than 300 people from 62 countries gathered in Rasi Salai, Thailand, for Rivers for Life: The Second International Meeting of Dam-Affected People and their Allies. For five days grassroots activists, dam-affected people and representatives from NGOs exchanged experiences and developed new strategies to fight destructuve large dams. This is their story. Rivers for Life - Part 1 Rivers for Life - Part 2

The Chixoy Dam and its Pueblo Viejo Hydroelectric facility, built by INDE (Instituto Nacional de Electrificación) with financing from the Inter–American Development Bank and the World Bank, is the major source of electrical power for the nation of Guatemala. Chixoy Dam–Affected Communities and the Rio Negro Massacres Designs for this facility were approved, the project financed, and construction begun in 1975 without notifying the local population. Construction began without conducting a comprehensive census of affected peoples, without legal acquisition of all the land supporting the

As the world’s financial leaders gather in Washington for the annual meetings of the World Bank (Sept. 24–25), help for Africa will be high on the agenda. But the Bank’s biggest dam project in Africa, the Lesotho Highlands Water Project (LHWP)1 – sold as a way of pulling Lesotho out of poverty while supplying water to South Africa – is, according to the Bank itself, failing those who sacrificed everything for the project. Poverty is increasing in communities directly affected by the scheme’s dams, and project–affected people are resorting to marching in the streets of Lesotho’s

The family faced the danger of being swallowed up by the giant Mohale dam of the Lesotho Highlands Water Project. At long last there seems to be some hope for the Lakabane family which was left in the middle of the Mohale dam of the Lesotho Highlands Water Project (LHWP) after the Lesotho Highlands Development Authority (LHDA) refused to resettle them elsewhere to make way for the construction of the gigantic reservoir. According to Mothusi Seqhee, a Community Worker for the Transformation Resource Centre (TRC), a non–governmental organization that monitors the social and envi

As the Lesotho Highlands Development Authority (LHDA) continues to compensate communities affected by the giant Lesotho Highlands Water Project (LHWP) in the Butha–Buthe district, notably in the ‘Muela and Khukhune areas, some communities similarly affected by the Project in the Thaba–Tseka and Maseru districts say the multi–billion dollar water scheme has forgotten about them. In August 2002, the LHDA paid out compensation of over M400, 000 to the ‘Muela community for their communal assets that were affected by the Project. The money was paid out to about 300 villages whos

As the impoundment of the Mohale reservoir of the giant Lesotho Highlands Development Project (LHWP) which started on Friday, November 1, 2002 is regarded as a milestone in the implementation of Phase 1B of the Project, The future remains uncertain and bleak for some local communities living around the reservoir. According to the Lesotho Highlands Development Authority (LHDA) the impoundment of the Mohale reservoir is being done at the start of the rainy season in order to capture as much as possible of the season s rainfall. The future and fate of the people living upstream of

It is the largest water scheme of its kind in the world. It is a brilliant engineering feat surpassed by none of its kind, and has opened once inaccessible rugged Lesotho highlands through a series of roads that lead to its large reservoirs such as the Katse, Mohale, and Muela dams. It is a multi–billion Dollar project called the Lesotho Highland Development Project (LHWP) which enjoys the financial support of multi–national corporations such as the World Bank and others and injects millions of Maloti into the Lesotho economy by selling water to the economic powerhouse of the Ga

Police Confiscate Documents Belonging to LHWP Critic  Maseru: Three agents of Lesothos National Security Service (NSS) have repeatedly harassed Mr. Benedict Leuta in recent months. Leuta is a resident of the Lesotho Highlands who lost land to the recently constructed Katse Dam. On their first visit to him on 19 November, the NSS seized documents from Leutas home in the village of Ha Nkokana (Thaba–Tseka District). Leuta had just returned from a meeting in Cape Town sponsored by several non–governmental organisations (NGOs) during which he presented a paper on the effects of Ka