A Man of Several Worlds: A Profile of Leonides Quiroz, Wounaan

We do not want to be reminded that it is we, the indigenous people, who are poor and exploited in the land of our birth.
Steven Biko


A Life Worthy of a Book

Without a doubt, Leonides Quiroz’s story is worthy of a book.

His infancy and part of his childhood in the jungles of Darién; his dramatic move to the capital, at age seven; his escape from the crowded, one-room house where he lived with distant relatives; his informal adoption by a family of means; his acculturation into mainstream Panamanian society; his two years in the United States, where he learn to speak English; and his return to Panamá all contain the elements that make up great fiction.

But what most defines Leonides Quiroz today is the rediscovery of his Wounaan heritage. And it is this finding that has helped him determine his purpose in life. And in his quest to fulfill his destiny, in only a few short years Leonides has become a prominent spokespersons for his people.

In the Jungle

“I was born in a Wounaan community in Darién, thirty-five years ago, in a village named Chitola, which doesn’t exist anymore.”

Thus began Leonides’s life, in a hamlet that is no longer found on maps—wiped away, as many of his people, by modernity.

His father left before his birth, and his mother, in turn, moved on shortly thereafter, never looking back while she left the infant in the care of his maternal grandmother. The responsibility of raising the child forced the grandmother to move to Taimatí, a village of four-hundred inhabitants located on the Bahía de San Miguel, the very place where nearly five centuries earlier the Spanish explorer Vasco Núñez de Balboa became the first European to set eyes on the Pacific Ocean.

“As a boy I lived the type of life one sees in a National Geographic documentary. I didn’t wear clothes—only a loincloth, at most. But let me assure you that there is nothing romantic about living in the jungles of Darién, the poverty there is excruciating. As far back as I can remember I wanted to escape that. And ever since I was a child I used to say to myself, ‘Someday I’ll make it to the capital.’”

In Panamá City

When Leonides was seven, one of his mother’s sisters received a call from her husband, who had left for Panamá city a few months before, asking her to join him. Not wanting to travel alone, she asked her mother if Leonides could accompany her. The grandmother, not without considerable misgivings and sadness, gave her blessing.

“I promised her that I would return, but she just shook her head and said, ‘No, son. You won’t be back. You’re very intelligent. They’ll put you in a school to study and you’ll forget about us, as well you should.’”

Almost at once, Leonides discovered that life in the city was far from being what he had dreamed. His aunt and uncle lived in one of the poorest neighborhoods and in severely overcrowded quarters—ten persons in one tiny room. To earn his keep, Leonides, who spoke almost no Spanish at the time, harvested nances and collected aluminum cans that he sold to recyclers.

What’s more, throughout the entire year Leonides lived with his urban kin, his uncle kept threatening to send the boy back to Darién, telling him that he was a burden.

The Runaway

“I had decided that I’d rather run away from home than let them send me back to Darién.”

One afternoon, while his uncle was betting on the horses at the Hipódromo José Remón Cantera, Leonides, then eight years old, decided to wait for him outside, resting in the shade of a tree. An elderly Afro-Antillean gentleman approached him and they began to talk. After hearing Leonides’s story—although the boy’s Spanish was limited—the man had become so impressed with his intelligence that he offered to introduce him to his bosses, the Alvarado family, founders and directors of the Judo Club de San Francisco, located in one of Panamá city’s wealthiest neighborhoods.

Upon meeting Leonides, the Alvarados were equally impressed. They invited him to live with them, as another member of the family and, without hesitation, the boy accepted. And his uncle, happy to see Leonides go, never asked the child where he was headed as he left the house with his scant belongings.

Captain Judo

The Alvarado family, in addition to enrolling Leonides in school, began to train him in judo. (Before long, Leonides was representing Panamá in international tournaments. And several years later, from 1987-1990, he was captain of Panamá’s National Junior Judo Team). But these were turbulent times in Panamá, and the Alvarado family, who openly opposed General Manuel Antonio Noriega’s regime, had their properties confiscated. In 1986, they were forced into exile, moving to the United States and settling in Michigan. And because of economics, as well as visa issues, the Alvarados were forced to leave Leonides behind, but in the care of relatives of theirs.

At last, nearly five years later, the Alvarados sent for Leonides. In their absence, he had felt abandoned and became depressed. To counter these feelings, he started visiting the Wounaan Center in Panamá city in an attempt to reconnect with his heritage. And now, faced with a trip to the United States and uncertain when he’d return to Panamá, Leonides decided to go deep into Darién to try to find his grandmother.

The Return of the Prodigal Son

In 1992, ten years after his departure, Leonides journeyed back to the jungle of his birth. Although Spanish was now his dominant language, he still remembered enough Wounaan to comprehend the commotion his return caused.

“My grandmother and the rest of my relatives had assumed that I was dead. When I told them who I was, they all took a step back, as if they were terrified of me. Finally, a cousin who was braver than the rest, I suppose, took a few cautious steps forward, reached out slowly, touched my arm with his fingertips, and asked, ‘Are you really alive, or are you a ghost?’”

That same day, Leonides learned that his mother lived even deeper in the jungle. He decided to go looking for her.

With the help of a relative, who went along as his guide, Leonides found her. Without identifying himself, he walked up to the woman and asked, “Have you lost a son?”

“Yes, I lost a boy long ago,” she answered, the pain in her voice genuine.

“Well, then, I hope that now you’ll rejoice, for I am that lost son.”

Mother and son spent one joyful day together, finally reunited after eighteen years. And Leonides was thrilled to meet five half-brothers he had never known about. At the end of their meeting, Leonides promised his mother that he would return someday to visit. He then went back to the capital, and shortly thereafter left for the United States.

In the States, and Back

In Michigan, the Alvarado family enrolled Leonides in high school, where he learned English. He had been in the States for two years and was just beginning to feel at home when he received an urgent phone call from relatives in Panamá: his mother had disappeared.

“I returned to Darién as quickly as I could and immediately went looking for her. When I got to where we had met a couple of years before, people who lived nearby told me that my mother’s husband had fled, moving deeper into the jungle, and that he took my brothers with him. My guide and I went looking for them. When we finally found them, I was appalled to see the primitive conditions in which my brothers were living, almost like monkeys. Their father then told me that a dark, evil spirit had come out of the jungle and dragged my mother away. That was the last he saw of her, he said. But to this day I’m sure he killed her. My brothers say that he’s a violent man. But there was nothing I could do to prove his guilt; plus, deep in Darién, law enforcement doesn’t exist. But I was determined not to let him keep my brothers. Over his objections, I convinced them to leave with me. I then took them to my grandmother, whom they had never met. She raised them with the help of the money I started sending every month. But now, with this new responsibility, I was unable to return to the States.”

With Leonides’s support and encouragement, all five of his brothers have graduated from high school, which is quite an accomplishment for boys raised in the jungle. And the eldest is now a member of Panamá’s police force. Moreover, he has started attending courses in the university in the hope of becoming a lawyer.

“My grandmother is the heart and soul of our family. She has more than one-hundred and fifty descendants. Every year I organize a party to honor her. Its three days of food, drink and laughter with close to one thousand guests. All the members of my family are indebted to her.”

Rediscovering His Identity

Thanks of his knowledge of English, Leonides got a job with the Panamá Canal Commission, where he helped in the administration of pension funds. But as the turnover of the control of the Canal approached, the Commission started to phase out employees. And, since Leonides didn’t have much seniority, he was one of the first to be laid off.

Soon, though, he received a job offer to work in the Emberá-Wounaan court, in Chocó. This was his introduction to the politics of Panamá’s indigenous communities.

“I started attending meetings of the Emberá-Wounaan and began learning about the many problems we face: poverty, lack of adequate health care, poor education, misspent funds, and the list goes on and on. I also learned that politics negatively influence the indigenous courts, which shouldn’t be the case.”

Although the Wounaan leaders at first didn’t consider Leonides to be one of them, because of the many years he had spent among Ladinos (non-indigenous people), they eventually came to trust him. What’s more, his knowledge of the outside world was proving to be extremely valuable.

“In leaving my world I experienced a vastly different life from theirs, and when I started to work with the courts I saw a chance to bring to my people the best of what I had learned. I became a bridge between cultures, of sorts.”

Before long, Leonides became the Wounaan’s most respected advisor with regard to how to deal with outsiders. And he also learned about the greatest political problem the Wounaan people face: because of political expediency, the Panamanian government have lumped the Emberá and the Wounaan together as if they were one nation. As a result, although the law states that both people must share all resources equally, sadly, this is not the case.

“The Emberá allot almost all the government funding to themselves. We, the Wounaan, receive little of the resources to which we’re entitled.”

The cause of this unfairness resides in demographics: the Emberá number 24,000, and they are concentrated in areas where polling booths are easily accessible. The Wounaan, on the other hand, are only 10,000, and they tend to live in areas of difficult access.

“When I realized the injustice my people face, I made a vow to fight for our rights, to use everything I have learned in the outside world for our benefit.”

A major fight Leonides was engaged in fairly recently, in 2003, was against squatters—all Ladinos—who took over land belonging to the Wounaan. The intruders were clearing large tracts of rainforest to use for agriculture and for raising cattle. The tension became so extreme, and the government’s inaction so frustrating, that the Wounaan finally took matters into their own hands: they burned down every building the squatters had constructed. In this battle, which drew considerable local attention, Leonides became the spokesperson for the Wounaan before the press.

“The world needed to learn the truth of why we did what we did. Our actions were harsh, but the jungles are sacred to us and they were being destroyed—and continue to be destroyed—at an alarming pace.”

In the court battles that ensued, the Wounaan needed an attorney to represent them. It was Leonides’s task to hire one, but every single lawyer he approached charged a fee that was far beyond the means of the Wounaan. At last, after a frustrating and futile search, Leonides decided to enroll in law school himself. This was four years ago. He will be graduating with a license to practice law in April of 2008, which will make him the first Wounaan attorney in Panamanian history.

“Many years ago, my mom from the Alvarado family prophesized that one day I would become an attorney, and that my life’s mission would be to protect my people. I was twelve at the time, and I thought her vision was nothing but a fantasy. But now, it’s about to become true. And after I finish I want to go on to get a Masters in Indigenous Law at the University of Arizona.”

If Leonides accomplishes this dream, he’ll become the first indigenous person from Latin America to do so.

Friends in the United States have set up an organization to help Leonides and the Wounaan in their fight for justice: Native Future. Anyone interested in contacting them, or in making a donation, can visit their website at http://www.nativefuture.org/.

“Legally, we, the Wounaan, do not exist as an autonomous people. My goal is to for us to be recognized as separate from the Emberá. Then we’ll be able to seek legislation that will help solve the problems that are unique to us.”

Leonides Quiroz’s journey, in only thirty-five years, has been extraordinary—from the jungles of Darién, to Panamá, to the United States, and then back. His life’s voyage has made him a man of several worlds and, hopefully, a bridge of understanding between three distinct cultures.