The Kelwo Association of Chiloé, an organization of Mapuche residents of Chile’s island-province, was formed in 2001 to bring to public attention one of the great social debts of Chilean democracy: the right to health and life of people in indigenous communities affected by HIV/AIDS. Kelwo takes its name from the Mapuche word for “loom” (according to Mapuche rites and myths, life is a loom and every stitch a day). The group, which originally came together to fight for indigenous rights generally, was re-founded in 2005 specifically to fight for indigenous people with HIV/AIDS. Upon its re-launch, it received the backing of Armando Llaitureo Manquemilla, the elder leader of the General Council of Williche Mapuche Caciques of Chiloé, making him the first indigenous authority on the continent to publicly recognize the scourge of HIV/AIDS among his people.
The members of Kelwo belong, in the great majority, to the Mapuche/Williche people, with their legendary history of caciques and warriors. They continue demonstrating the strength and vitality of their historical struggle, which now includes a struggle for life itself, and one of the key battles is for intercultural prevention. Willy Morales, the president of Kelwo, relates that one day the group was invited to a meeting with the Mapuche communities of the city of Santiago to discuss the question of AIDS and the problematic relationship with the Catholic Church and its discourse of sin. There they tried to broach the topic in another way, not as a problem but as a response and a solution. The group is convinced that the initiative for a successful struggle against HIV/AIDS will come from the people who are most directly affected.
The principal Kelwo demand has been for the installation of a specialized HIV/AIDS center on the island of Chiloé so that people no longer have to travel to the mainland for treatment. The group’s members have sworn to Chu Gnechen (Father God) to fight for their lives and for a health center. Often, seriously ill HIV-positive people have to travel hundreds of miles, sometimes becoming stranded on the road because the connections to the mainland are closed for bad weather. At present, Kelwo attends to indigenous people and their families with traditional medicine, using their own resources and those of the communities that belong to the General Council of Caciques of Chiloé.
In the give-and-take of struggle, Kelwo has gained important political space; for demanding better medical care, the group has come to be classified by the authorities as a “conflictive” organization. One of its most critical moments came when a peñi, or communal brother, died after being unable to leave the island to get treatment, an event that dramatically demonstrated the urgency of the island’s demands and health care needs. To strengthen its negotiating position, Kelwo sought the backing of other organizations on the island and gained the support of two key groups and an individual: the diocese-run organizations One For All Foundation and Radio Star of the Sea, as well as Ana María Olivera, a dynamic lawyer who specializes in indigenous questions.
The tourist-oriented One For All Foundation has advised the group and trained it in the language and discourse it must to use to deal with the press and the authorities. Radio Star of the Sea began openly supporting Kelwo’s cause, broadcasting human testimonies of the health crises of people living with HIV, while Olivera brought legal action when the authorities refused to listen to Kelwo’s demands. Up to now, Kelwo has brought suit against the authorities for not respecting the right to life, and they have sued for the inclusion of indigenous concerns in the country’s massive communication campaigns for the prevention of HIV/AIDS. In so doing, they have generated some disagreements with non-indigenous HIV organizations that don’t entirely appreciate the importance of a multicultural approach to fighting the epidemic.
The conflict has become so great that the bishop of Chiloé, Monsignor Juan Luis Ysern, has felt called upon to come out in defense of the area’s HIV-positive indigenous people. In homilies and press conferences the bishop has expressed his unconditional support for the indigenous HIV struggle.
One of Kelwo’s most memorable activist actions took place in 2006 when a brother living with HIV had to undergo an operation; he could no longer eat and was in unbearable pain. Given his life-threatening situation, the organization decided to undertake a hunger strike, asking the priest of the Castro parish for authorization to enter the church—considered the patrimony of humankind and the under the political protection of the Vatican—in order to hold a public protest that would not be threatened by the Carabineros, Chile’s national police. The national press covered the event, which thus made an impact and acquired importance, so much so that the Chiloé Department of Health began to monitor the health of the protesters, and the provincial government sought to halt the strike because it threatened the strikers’ lives. Finally, the brother was transported to a facility where he was successfully operated on, and several communal sisters received immediate human papilloma virus tests.
Kelwo has also participated in several projects aimed at HIV/AIDS prevention. The first was the creation of public advertising campaign, financed by the National Women’s Service. A widely distributed poster was headlined “Lagnmien Domo” (sister woman) and was directed at indigenous women, with translation from the Mapuche language. The members of the organization distributed the posters to all the hospitals and indigenous communities of the region. In addition, in 2005, they received financing from the Regional Campaign for AIDS Prevention in the Lakes Region and, for the first time, launched a campaign against HIV/AIDS in an indigenous area. This took place in the commune of Quellón, with the presence of prominent AIDS activists, local health authorities, and representatives of the indigenous authority, who stressed the importance of intercultural prevention. Similarly, they held workshops and created an educational poster specifically for the Mapuche/Williche people.
In 2006, the National Narcotics Control Commission launched a project called Castro Prevention, with the intention of showing the relation between HIV and alcohol abuse, an endemic problem in indigenous communities. In this campaign they created more visual images and visited all the schools of the commune. At the same time, the organization created a radio program called Positive Dialogue, interviewing national figures like the health and planning ministers. In August, the voices of the largely unknown process of social transformation among indigenous peoples of the continent will unite to demand respect for human rights and multicultural identity at the International AIDS Conference in Mexico City. Both Morales and Kelwo will travel a long road to arrive there, and they know that an equally long road still lies ahead.
Víctor Hugo Robles is a journalist and LGTB activist known as “the Che Guevara of the Gays.” He is the editorial director of the magazine Vivo Positivo (www.vivopositivo.org).
