Located in the Amazon forest, Yasuní is home to the two last Ecuadorian indigenous peoples living in voluntary isolation, known as Tagaeri and Taromenane; Yasuní has also been rated by several scientific studies as the most bio diverse spot in the world.

Yasuní National Park, however stores in its subsoil large oil reserves, the Ishpingo, Tambococha, Tiputini (ITT) blocks, which retain as 20% equivalent deposit of total oil reserves of Ecuador; an amount that may be an important source of money but also recalls the pollution caused by Texaco, now known as Chevron, a company that has just lost a multimillion lawsuit filed by the affected indigenous and peasant people.

YASunidos is a coalition of mostly young environmentalists, animal activists, students, professionals, feminists, indigenous and foreign nationals, among others; they decided to unite and strengthen the dream of saving the Yasuní from oil exploitation, once Ecuadorian President Rafael Correa announced the closure of the Yasuní-ITT Initiative; this initiative was seeking to raise about $ 3,500 million, half of the money expected from the extraction of the oil, in exchange for leaving in the subsoil 840 million oil barrels and thereby avoiding the emission to the atmosphere of 407 million metric tons of carbon dioxide , an amount equivalent to a year’s emissions of France and Brazil.

YASunidos group of dreamers doesn’t have any structure, financing or previous experience; however it assumed the daunting task of collecting at least 584,000 signatures, equivalent to 5% of the electoral rolls according to what rules Article 104 of the Ecuadorian Constitution, to get a call for a referendum and thus avoid the oil exploration in Yasuní area.

Gradually YASunidos has grown and gained presence in the whole country; the signature collection was conducted in towns and cities, in the countryside and in the inhabited center; this signature collection thus became a reference activity for many organizations that have been resisting for years the advance of the extractive policy and all other policies that go against the people's interests, although implemented  by successive governments; this signature collection became, so far, a task where many popular sectors united again.

On April the 12^th, 2014, YASunidos handed over 757,623 signatures, a amount higher than the constitutionally required 584,323. One month later however, the National Electoral Council (NEC), the institution responsible for regulating elections, officially announced that YASunidos had not reached the required minimum number of signatures.

How could this happen? The president of that institution, Dr. Domingo Paredes, while the deadline for collecting signatures was still running, in a television interview stated that YASunidos had deceived the society in asking signature support with the view that oil exploitation was to involve no more than 1x1000 of the park’s total area. From all evidence, this institution -responsible for verifying the authenticity of the signatures-, had been already siding with the government thesis: oil extraction from the block in the Yasuni ITT would be done.

While not surprised at all by the verdict, viewing how the NEC had acted to the detriment of the YASunidos signature collection, Ecuadorian society has not hidden its outrage at this decision.

"We will not allow to exploit the Yasuní; we will exhaust all national and if necessary all international courts. More than 72% of the Ecuadorian population wants the consultation and we will not fail those who have supported us," said Antonella Calle, one of the main YASunidos spokespersons.

Many sectors of civil society have organized actions to support both the referendum and the goal “Saving Yasuní”. The joint report of two Ecuadorian prestigious universities, for example, shows that the total number of valid signatures must have exceeded 670,000; the methodology used was the analysis of the authenticity of a statistical sample of 2,508 forms (equivalent to 20,064 records) randomly chosen among those reviewed by the CNE; even admitting the normal margin of error of these studies, the result confirms the validity of the collected signatures.

Thus, we could name many other initiatives that support and advance the work of YASunidos and its fight to save the Yasuní and its so great bio-diversity, but above all, the lives of the most vulnerable people in the country, the indigenous peoples in voluntary isolation, the Tagaeri and the Taromenane.

The whole of Ecuador is determined to bring back to the world the illusion of a post-oil society where true balance in their human-nature relationship is achieved.

* Patricio Chavez studied Sociology and Political Science at the Central University of Ecuador, is currently a Class Member YASunidos