MEMBERS of the Waorani tribe are to take the Ecuadorian government to court on Thursday alleging numerous human rights violations as the government earmarks their land for oil extraction companies.

President Lenin Moreno’s government last year divided Ecuador up into blocks and plans to hold auctions for extractive oil companies to bid on.

#WaoraniResistance: Bringing the Forest to the Courtroom from Amazon Frontlines on Vimeo.

One of these, Block 22, overlaps almost entirely with the 500,000 acres of highly biodiverse, Amazonian rainforest the Waorani tribe have called home for thousands of years.

Both national and international law state that governments must first seek the free and informed consent of any community that could be affected by extraction projects before they begin.

However, the Waorani’s lawsuit refers to a 2012 consultation between them and the government which the tribe alleges mentioned nothing about negative repercussions.

Hundreds of Waorani  and other indigenous peoples marched in traditional clothes through El Puyo, the capital of Pastaza province, to the provincial judicial council in February where they submitted a lawsuit against Mr Moreno’s government.

“We are demanding that the Ecuadoran state respect our territory and self-determination,” said Nemonte Nenquimo, a Waorani protester and representative of the Co-ordinating Council of the Waorani Nationality Ecuador Pastaza.

“This fight didn’t grow overnight, it’s been the fight of the Waorani for years.”

Jairo Irumenga, a Waorani protester, told reporters that indigenous communities in Pastaza don’t want to see the same environmental destruction that has been happening in Ecuador’s north where Western oil companies have operated since the 1970s to be repeated.

“Before, people weren’t awake, but now we are,” Mr Irumenga said.

“The people who are here say they want to keep living, fishing and bathing in clean water, not fishing contaminated fish and bathing in contaminated water.”

Former president Rafael Correa offered to leave the oil in the ground in exchange for £2.7 billion from the global community, which would be invested in renewable energy, in 2007.

The offer never came to fruition and Mr Correa scrapped the plans in 2013.

Mr Moreno’s government initially promised to protect indigenous people’s rights but appears to have reneged on the issue.