FEDERAL COURT GRANTS RANCHERS CONTROL OF

TRADITIONAL TERENA LAND

 

    The Federal Court in Mato Grosso do Sul reached a verdict which granted ranchers control of lands traditionally occupied by the Terena people, in the Dois Irmãos do Buriti and Sidrolândia region. The decision, announced on October 8, is based on the assumption that the indigenous people have not traditionally occupied the lands, because they are part of an extinct village.

    The judge of the 3rd Federal Jurisdiction in Mato Grosso do Sul, Odilon de Oliveira, did not accept the argument presented by the indigenous people and by the Public Prosecutor’s Office that the village only became extinct because the Terena were thrown off their lands and confined to small reservations in a process that has been in progress since the start of the 20th century.

    Manoelito Pereira, leader of the Córrego do Meio village, said that “the decision saddened us greatly because the anthropologists who carried out the research came down in favor of the indigenous people, but the judge decided against us.”

    In his decision, the judge claims “the documents do not show any concrete evidence, but only indications or vague reports of the indigenous people having been driven away from the disputed areas by means of physical threats or violence. It is also true that after settling in the 2,090 hectares referred to [in the Buriti indigenous land], they began to live peacefully with the owners and worked for them until recently, when they decided to use violence and invade the lands in dispute, driving the ranchers away.”

    The judge also argues that “the indigenous people themselves say that there were no stones left standing, because over the decades the environment had been adapted to suit the activities of the white man.” There was, therefore, nowhere to fish, hunt or plant food. “We are dealing with a village that has been extinct for almost a century, and with irreversibly altered conditions that are no good to the indigenous people.”

    According to Manoelito, in the areas reoccupied in 2000 the Terena grow rice, corn, manioc and beans, which are the basic items for their subsistence. Since these lands were reoccupied, the people have been campaigning to have the boundaries of the Buriti indigenous land revised to cover around 17,000 hectares.

    In 2003, a Technical Group (GT) set up by Funai identified the land claimed by the Terena as indigenous land. The same judge declared the report of the working group void and asked for a new study in November 2003, setting a deadline of 120 days for it to be concluded. The anthropologists designated by the Federal Court once again recognized that the land was indigenous and, in spite of this, the verdict now passed grants the land to the ranchers.  

 

 

PATAXÓ PROTEST AGAINST FEDERAL POLICE ACTION

DURING LAND RESTORATION

 

    The Pataxó Resistance and Struggle Front and the Cassiana community, in the South of Bahia, have protested to the federal institutions against police actions during land restoration that took place on October 7 on the Santa Luzia Ranch, which was reoccupied in June this year by the Pataxó.

    According to a communication signed by the indigenous leaders and addressed to the Public Prosecutor’s Office, the National Foundation for Indigenous People (Funai)

and the Ministry of Justice, the community decided to remain there. “We have decided to stay on the land, a sacred right of our people,” the document states.

    There are 20 families on the ranch, who say that they have decided to no longer accept the presence of the Federal Police from Porto Seguro in their area. According to the Pataxó from the Cassiana community, the police opened fire on houses in another community that also returned to its land in June.

    “There are still gunmen on the ranches neighboring our village who threaten and attack us, as in fact took place on 29 September 2004, when two indigenous people from the Boca da Mata settlement were beaten up and received death threats from a gunman,” they warn.

    The Federal Police had said that they would return to the area on Wednesday, October 13, to carry out the land rights court order. “The situation is serious and we are being threatened. This is why we have asked the authorities to take urgent measures to guarantee our rights and our lives,” the Pataxó document claims.

 

 

INDIANIST APOENA MEIRELLES ASSASSINATED IN RONDÔNIA

 

    The Indianist, José Apoena Soares de Meirelles, 55 years old, was assassinated in Porto Velho, Rondônia, last Saturday night (9 October). Federal Police investigations indicate that the assassination took place during a hold-up, as Meirelles was coming out of a bank. Yesterday (13 October) a 17-year old man was arrested, confessed to the crime and was identified by the Funai staff-member who was with Apoena at the time of the assassination.

     According to the newspaper O Globo, “the Ministry of Justice will wait for the report from the Federal Police of Rondônia to decide if it will send a team from Brasília to carry out further investigations.” The Federal Police of Rondônia considers the case closed.  Doubts concerning the motive behind the death of Meirelles are linked to his role in prospecting issues.

    Meirelles was a member of a committee that was investigating illegal diamond mining activities in the Roosevelt indigenous land, belonging to the Cinta-Larga people, and had the job of fostering a dialogue between government institutions and the indigenous people, as well as strengthening the search for strategies to end the prospecting.

    President of the National Foundation for Indigenous People in the 1980s and ex-director of the Xingu national Park, Apoena was one of the first white men to make contact with the Cinta-Larga. He was retired, but had recently been invited to return to work in Rondônia.

     “On hearing the comments of the indigenous people of Rondônia about the murder of Apoena, it could be felt that he left the mark of a leader who had always been dedicated and committed to defending the peoples and maintaining a dialogue based on trust with the indigenous communities,” says the note issued by the Cimi team in Rondônia.

 

 

Brasília, 14 October 2004