Having begun on November 5 and ending today, in the municipalities of Caarapó and Amambai, in Mato Grosso do Sul, the “Colloquium on the Guarani Child: Right to Life without Violence”. The event, which is being held for the first time, is conducted for the purpose of discussing the curbing of violations of the rights of the Guarani indigenous population, especially the infant-juvenile portion [of the population].

 

According to Estela Márcia Scandola, Coordinator of the State Committee for Confronting Sexual Violence Against Children and Adolescents / MS and a member of the national coordination, the importance of this event is in succeeding in convening women, leaders, scholars and government agencies for discussing violence against the Guarani children and the impacts it causes on them.

 

“The municipality of Caarapó is being turned into a major center for sugar cane plantations. With the arrival of these large projects there is a reordering effect on social organization of the villages. The villages are no longer a place where the indigenous peoples make their decisions”, clarifies Estela.

 

With the installation of large enterprises the villages are experiencing not only transformation in the dynamic of indigenous life with the departure of the men to work in other activities, but also the increase in cases of violence and abuse against children and adolescents. According to Estela, even the government has denied assistance to the villages.

 

“The State General Procurator at present prohibits the civil or military police from acting in cases of violence against indigenous children. Only the federal police can act. No explanation was given for this decision and as such the indigenous children and adolescents remain ever more invisible”, denounces Estela.

 

Due to lack of protection coming from the government the indigenous women are coming forward to attempt to end the barbaric violence committed in their territories. The women’s groups are participating in order to confront, analyze and denounce the arrival of non-indigenous persons in their villages. “The women are assuming all the roles previously divided, because the men are now working outside”, says Estela.

 

Since April of this year several women from the village of Tey’kue, in Caarapó, have been keeping a critical eye over their communities and maintaining logs of reports on violence, rapes, frustrated visits to the police station, to the doctor, and finally, all of the steps of a sad and different reality from their previous lives.

 

“What is happening is that the village is going through various cases of sexual violence and exploitation of the adolescents. The men commit crimes, are taken to the police station, but nothing happens, no one is arrested. It is very difficult to be arrested. When there is an occurrence, first we talk to the leaders, then we talk with the Tutelary Council. When we go to the police station to report a case that we become aware of only two or three days after it occurs, the delegates say they can´t do nothing as there is no ´in flagrante’ (caught red-handed, in the act). In this way, the men return to the village and commit the same crimes, they are left to molest the children”, relates Júlia Soares, a resident of Tey’kue village. 

 

The Colloquium ends today in Caarapó and reopens in Amambai. Its convening is being sponsored by the State Committee for Confronting Sexual Violence Against Children and Adolescents (COMCEX/MS) and by the Brazilian Institute of Pro-Society Healthy Innovations / Central-West (IBISS/CO).

 

Participating in the discussions are indigenous leaders, members of the care network for the child and adolescent, of public security, the State Public Ministry, governmental agencies, representatives of the Municipal and State Legislature, in addition to members of entities linked to human rights and indigenous concerns.

 

Natasha Pitts

Adital Journalist