The plenary of the Chamber of Deputies is due to vote this Tuesday (30) on the bill for the time frame for the demarcation of indigenous lands (PL 490/2007). For indigenous leaders, the project represents a “great threat” to their lives and that is why they say they are willing to fight and resist approval. This morning (30), Guarani indigenous people, who live on Pico do Jaraguá, in São Paulo, blocked the Bandeirantes Highway, at km 20, towards São Paulo, to protest. “I don’t know if we’re going to be able to stop this vote. But what I can say is that we are tired of suffering this violence. We are tired of being threatened and having our lives under all the impact that non-indigenous people bring to us,” said Thiago Karai Djekupe, one of the leaders of the Jaraguá indigenous land, in São Paulo, in an interview this Monday (29) to Agência Brazil. “Backing off, for us, is not an option. We are going to resist, we are going to take a stand, and if they try to repossess any indigenous land, it is necessary to understand that they will have to take our lives. The territory is what we are. If we have to resist, if we have to fight, if we have to fall so that others can continue to fight, we will. Retreat, for us, is not an option. Regardless of any threat that is posed to our lives, there are more than 500 years under this violence, there are more than 500 years of this ignorance and it will not be in this generation, in my generation, that we will bow down”, added Karai Djekupe. According to him, native peoples are mobilized across the country to follow the vote in Congress. Yesterday (29), for example, the Guaranis of São Paulo held demonstrations in Largo São Francisco, in the capital of São Paulo, and a great vigil in the Jaraguá indigenous land. Today (30), new acts must be carried out across the country demanding that the law not be approved. “The whole of Brazil will be mobilizing and we are going to mobilize here in our base, our territory”, said the indigenous leader. The bill that creates the so-called temporal framework establishes that the places occupied by traditional peoples until October 5, 1988, the date of promulgation of the Constitution, will be considered indigenous lands. The Magna Carta does not provide for this framework as a criterion, since indigenous peoples are original people who were present in the country long before European colonization. But the issue is also the subject of analysis by the Federal Supreme Court (STF), which must decide, on June 7th, whether the time frame thesis is valid or not. “If that happen [a tese do marco temporal for aprovada], means that several lands and indigenous peoples, who have no way of proving the demarcation process as required by this framework, will suffer expulsion and violence from their territories – and this violence will be legitimized by a repossession action based on the thesis of timeframe,” said Karai Djekupe. “[Esse projeto de lei é] to make our lives more fragile, to take over our territories, to carry out repossession and to commit violence,” he added. “We, indigenous peoples, will resist because we are our territories. Our understanding of belonging to the land is different from that of non-indigenous people. What will happen if the time frame is approved is this: they will start the repossession process and we will resist these repossessions”. The vote on the timeframe is not just a concern for native peoples. This Monday (29), the United Nations (UN) Office for Human Rights in South America released an alert demanding that Brazilian authorities take “urgent measures in favor of these populations, in accordance with international human rights standards”. According to the agency, initiatives such as this, by the National Congress, “risk the protection of indigenous peoples in the country.” “Approving the project known as the Temporal Framework would be a serious setback for the rights of these peoples, contrary to international human rights standards,” said Jan Jarab. head of UN Human Rights in South America. “The ownership of land existing in 1988, after the expansionism of the military dictatorship, does not represent the traditional relationship forged over centuries by peoples with their surroundings, arbitrarily ignoring territorial rights and the ancestral value of land for their way of life”, says the note. The international organization Human Rights Watch also expressed great concern about the time frame vote. In a statement, the organization said that “the Brazilian Congress should reject a bill that adopts an arbitrary time frame for the recognition of indigenous lands.” “The right of indigenous peoples to their territories does not begin or end on an arbitrary date,” said Maria Laura Canineu, Brazil director at Human Rights Watch. “Approving this bill would be an inconceivable setback, would violate human rights and would signal that Brazil is not honoring its commitment to defend those who have proven to best protect our forests,” she added.
Agência Brasil
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