Sad Turn of Events in Peru

Here in Peru things are moving forward. We will be breaking ground on the project in Urubamba on Monday, but we hit a snag with our other project in Huacarpay. (I’ve included an excerpt from an email from a project coordinator, John Kreider, below. )

As you know, the wife (Manuela) of the couple (the man’s name is Valentin) who we wanted to build a house for died. We all thought that the title to the land was clear, but apparently not.

Manuaela & Valentin's "house" since the 2010 floods

John Kreider, who wrote the email, was helping me coordinate the project with Pastor Celestino

The other project in Urubamba will help the Ormachea-Hermoza family (more than 12 of them) have a decent home.

Unfortunately, it doesn’t look like we will be able to help Valentin in Huacarpay, but the church will continue to care for him.

Email from John Kreider regarding Huacarpay site:

“…I went to Huacarpay today to meet with the architect. Celestino, another

pastor and I were just beginning to measure the lot when about 8 to 10 of

Manuela’s relatives showed up and were very upset that we were measuring

the lot. Their opinion is that the lot does not belong to Manuela and

Valentin. They say they presented a document, something like a will I

think, to the judge in Lucre that shows that Manuela’s sisters are the

owners and not Manuela. I thought this was all sorted out but it quickly

became apparent that it was not. We tried to see the judge to see what

document they presented but the judge had already left for the day.

Celestino is planning to go see the judge tomorrow morning to see what

the document says. I suspect that it will not be possible to build on the

lot since their opinion was that they just let Manuela live there until

she died, even though she had lived there for maybe 30 to 40 years at

least. It seems like the culture here is that the children get the

inheritance and since Manuela doesn’t have any living children, she

doesn’t get anything. The other relatives claim it as theirs instead. I

think Celestino was trying to stand up for Manuela and Valentin’s rights

but I think it is highly unlikely that Valentin will get title to the

land….

…I think it is unlikely that the situation will be able to be resolved any

time soon in order to be able to build there.

Sorry I don’t have better news for you. I was a little caught off guard

when we got there since I thought the situation had been resolved.”