Brazil: Violent land disputes between tribes and ranchers on the rise
Violent disputes over indigenous land are on the rise in Brazil, sparking heightened militancy by natives angered by broken promises of compensation and slower government registrations.
A report by the Indigenous Missionary Council (CIMI), cited by the Folha de Sao Paulo newspaper on Sunday, said the number of territorial conflicts jumped from 82 in 2006 to 99 last year.
Indigenous peoples are fighting to protect their resource-rich lands from invasions or encroachment by huge cattle ranchers, industrial-scale farmers, illegal gold miners and loggers.
In Brazil, according to national census just one percent of the 191-million-strong population controls almost half the cultivated land.
Problems facing the indigenous population include murders, death threats, lack of health care and education, and delays in registering land ownership, according to the CIMI report.
CIMI, created in 1972 by Brazil's National Confederation of Roman Catholic Bishops, reported an average of 55 murders of native people per year across the country between 2003 and 2011.
Tension is particularly high in the country's northern Amazon region, where the federal government is building the huge Belo Monte hydro-electrical dam across the Xingu River.
Angry indigenous activists frequently occupy the construction sites and occasionally take employees hostage to protest what they view as broken promises of compensation.
CIMI also highlighted a drop in indigenous land registrations by the government, from 145 under President Fernando Henrique Cardoso (1995-2002), down to 79 under president Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva (2003-2010), and only three last year under President Dilma Rousseff.
In remarks to Folha de Sao Paulo, Rinaldo Arruda, an anthropology professor at the Pontifical Catholic University of Sao Paulo (PUC-SP), noted a “conservative shift” by the Rousseff government as it dealt with the powerful pro-agribusiness bloc in Congress.
Activists, including members of the Xicrin, Juruna, Arara, Aweti, Assurini and Parakanawa tribes, are threatening fresh occupations of sites of the public consortium Norte Energia, which is in charge of the Belo Monte project.
Norte Energia insists it will honor signed compensation accords but indigenous chief Giliard Juruna told Folha de Sao Paulo: “We don't believe what they are saying.”
The third largest dam in the world, the 11,200-megawatt Belo Monte is one of several hydro projects meant to provide Brazil with clean energy for its fast-growing economy.
Indigenous groups fear the dam will harm their way of life, while environmentalists have warned of deforestation, greenhouse gas emissions and irreparable damage to the ecosystem.
The federal government plans to invest a total of 1.2 billion dollars to assist the displaced by the time the dam is completed in 2019.
In western Matto Grosso do Sul state, ethnic Kadiweus have been occupying 23 farms since May on land they claim. To the north, in Matto Grosso state, the Maraiwatsede are still waiting for ranchers to comply with a court ruling to evacuate their ancestral lands. In both cases, ranchers alleged errors in demarcation.
On July 19, the rights group Survival International pressed Brazilian authorities to end impunity for those behind the murders of indigenous people as it hailed the arrest of 18 suspects in the high-profile killing of a Guarani Indian chief in Mato Grosso do Sul last November.
According to CIMI, 51 indigenous people were killed across Brazil last year. Indigenous peoples represent less than one percent of the Brazilian population and occupy 12% of the national territory, mainly in the Amazon region.
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Brazil needs an agrarian reform to redistribute lands and promote development of local communities.
The federal and state governments MUST fulfil their obligations to recompense sensibly and in a timely fashion, however excessive the claims .... and these are usually extremely opportunistic.
The federal and state governments MUST catch and put on trial the killers, even though the real villains are their bosses (frequently the politicians themselves, or their family members).
The police are totally under-resourced and politically unprotected, particularly in Amazonia (personal knowledge).
The Belo Monte MUST be brought on stream as soon as possible.
Brasil's economic and industrial 'window of opportunity' will not be open forever.
“Get orf my land!”
#2-A refreshing post and as you say,the bosses are the real perpertrators .But I suppose the unfair distribution of wealth would make hitmen/security forces more amenable to commiting the crimes
#3-an anti-climax that has not contributed to the thread unfortunately.
I wonder what would happen if the indigenous attacked the owners.Theyd be savages again,yes.
They deserve land redistribuition reforms to allow them and their children to be able to work their own land without being subject to exploitation again and again.
Redistributing land along ethnic lines creates as many injustices as it seeks to amend.
It is very difficult to say who is indigenous and who is not. Even the most remote tribes have long since been penetrated by outsides, albeit to a small degree. Over the centuries explorers, loggers, hunters, escaped slaves, etc have contributed to the indigenous gene pool. Indigenous people have also migrated to the towns.
Here in Chile the Mapuche who fight for land reform are no more or less Mapuche than the majority of Chileans. Because of political sensitivities to fabricated ethnicities much land has been handed over to Mapuche communities. Analysis over the years shows that land that has been returned is either logged or lies abandoned. This causes great resentment amongst other poor sectors of society who don’t get this special treatment.
I am all in favour of redressing the balance and reducing poverty but it must be done along social/economic lines and not very blurred ethnic ones. This is the 21st century, we are republics and the clock cannot be turned back.
Remember when Sting purchased a big chunk of Amazon and then gave it to native tribe who then sold it and moved to the city? It kind of sums up the issue: people just want to get out of poverty.
I have plotted the distribution and creation of the quilombos in Bahia and beyond. So many were declared as soon as land and other 'rights' were accorded to ex-slave colonies. Few stand up to the scrutiny of historic habitation.
Equally, indigenous land rights have been claimed for (eg) the Government front lawn in Brasilia, the Brasilian capital. I have become used to 'normal' individuals known to me donning the feathers when the TV cameras arrive.
Land appropriation is not just an original 'colonial' thing.
Opportunistic land grabs are a feature of today's Brasil (and probably much of the world!) and not just by the 'coronels', etc.
The Movimento dos Trabalhadores Sem Terra, MST, is equally opportunistic but with less interest in land per se - sadly, more a political movement concerned with winning assets that can be cashed to move to the cities. Wikileaks Brasil has provided a superb expose.
During colonial times, most lands were owned either by european descendants or by the church. This was the case in Mexico and one reason why we had a revolution in 1910 when 1 or 2% of the population, the “terratenientes” owned more than 80% of arable land.
But you make a very good point. Land cannot be redistribute on ethnical grounds in Brazil, as the country´s very diverse.
The land reforms in Mexico were never addressed in terms of ethnicity but rather in terms of millions of mexicans who had been liberated from serfdom but were still unable to self support themselves because they had no land. Zapata fought a war and millions of mexicans received land, under conditions to use it for farming and with certain legal securities so they could not sell the land.
Some communities were successful, many were not and ended up abandoning their fields, but millions of mexicans benefited by owning land and being able to produce their own crops.
Strange how single events are quoted as reasons for not distributing land,when legislation and a desire to see distribution succeed are able to make it a reality
#2 Good post. That Dilma stood up to the landlord's coup in Paraguy (despite the interests of the rich Braziguayans) may be a hopeful sign
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