15 who replace forest with pasture, expanding the agricultural frontier and degrading their natural habitat, 61 conflicts and tensions have emerged over the use of the land and access to natural resources. One of 62 the main problems pointed out by the petitioners is the appropriation of lands by the settlers. The settlers have formed the peasant communities of Wacuco, Curtí, and Loma Bonita, and are organized in 63 the Federación de Trabajadores Agrícolas. C. Situation of the collective property rights of the Kuna Indigenous People of Madungandí and the Emberá of Bayano 1. Creation of the Indigenous Reserve of Upper Bayano, and the Comarca of Bayano and Darién (1930-1952) 71. In the early 1930s the Kuna situated in the Bayano basin carried out the first actions aimed at delimiting and recognizing their territory. According to the information presented by the parties, at the request of members of the indigenous people, in 1932 the government sent a surveyor to take the 64 first measurements of the geographic space occupied by the Kuna. The description of the expedition is in the record before the IACHR. It indicates that: For the purpose of measuring the lands that must be conserved as a reserve for the indigenous of the Bayano river and its tributaries, an arrangement was made with the chiefs (ságuilas) of the regions of Pintupo, Piriá, and Cañazas, by which the indigenous mentioned should contribute with the sum of One thousand five hundred balboas in cash (B/. 1,500.00) to the expenses incurred in the expedition by the topographic surveyors that the Government was going to send to those places. The obligations of the indigenous also included supplying food to all the members of the expedition and to clear the necessary dirt roads. The Government, for its part, had to contribute one thousand balboas (B/.1,000.00). On September 5, 1932, the Government communicated illegible Antonio Henríquez who had been designated chief of the commission that was to go to Bayano, district of Chepo, to take the measurements and illegible of the lands that are occupied by the indigenous tribes of that region, for whose work illegible the sum of B/. 290.90 monthly. illegible The measurement was to be 75 hectares for each head of family. On October 3 of the same year Mr. Henríquez was replaced by surveyor Blas Humberto D’Anello. In December I was asked by Mr. José E. illegible undersecretary of Agriculture and Public Works, that from that point I deal with Mr. D’Anello in relation to the work he was carrying out in the lands of Bayano and then, after I met with him, and with some chiefs and other indigenous persons, I drew up the following itinerary for him: Due to numerous difficulties and problems the Government was forced to increase by B/. illegible the sum of One thousand balboas that it had already spent for salaries and other expedition expenses. Mr. D’Anello and his helpers returned to Panama definitively in the middle of this year without having been able to close off the polygon on the piece of land; but the largest part of the perimeter was surveyed and today it is being drawn by the Technical Office of the Secretariat of 65 Agriculture and Public Works by the same Mr. D’Anello . 61 Petitioners’ initial petition of May 11, 2000. The members of the indigenous communities describe this practice as “devastation” (“devastación”), which in their words entails “clearing everything, felling the forest, the mountain, and then burning … and establishing themselves as owners, appropriating the land for themselves.” IACHR, Public hearing, March 23, 2012 on “Case 12,354 -Kuna of Madungandí and Emberá of Panama,” 144th regular period of sessions. Testimony of Bolívar Jaripio Garabato, member of the Emberá community of Piriatí and the Emberá General Congress of Alto Bayano. 62 Petitioners’ initial petition of May 11, 2000; Brief of additional observations on the merits by the petitioners, received by the IACHR on December, 18, 2009. 63 Annex 11. Final assessment document of the Mesa de Concertación of the Bayano Zone of July 2, 1999. Annex 31 to the petitioners’ initial petition of May 11, 2000. p. 3. 64 Annex 3. Alaka Wali, “Kilowatts and Crisis: Hydroelectric Power and Social Dislocation in Eastern Panama,” 26 Westview Press, Boulder, Colorado 1989. p. 31. Annex 51 to petitioners’ initial petition of May 11, 2000. 65 Annex 12. Annex 7 to petitioners’ initial petition of May 11, 2000. The petitioners also filed academic articles in which reference is made to the same facts: “By 1931 an engineer had been sent to survey the land and mark out the boundaries of the Continúa…