Magdalena Teitipac is a Zapotec community in the central region of Oaxaca whose hills contain gold and silver deposits. Townspeople were never consulted in 2007 when the federal government granted mining concessions to a subsidiary of Linear Gold until the year 2057, but upon realizing the threat of destruction that this project posed to their forests and way of life, people voted to oust the mining project and in an important victory, blocked its access to the mine, forcing it to withdraw, at least for the time being. teleSUR