–  Tupinikim and Guarani: Federal judge requests position from the minister of Justice

– Human Rights Committee discusses Estreito hydroelectric power plant in Palmas

 

 

Tupinikim and Guarani: Federal judge requests position from the minister of Justice

 

The Tupinikim and Guarani peoples reaffirmed their decision not to make any agreements with the Aracruz Celulose company, which has occupied their lands, located in the municipality of Aracruz, state of Espírito Santo. The leaders of these communities have not agreed to attend a hearing scheduled for May 23 by federal judge Isabel Cristina Longuinho for negotiations to be carried out between representatives of the company and of these indigenous communities on a lawsuit related to the possession of those lands.

                                                                                                      

Since no agreement seems to be possible, the judge set a deadline of 10 days to be informed, by the minister of Justice, if any decision has been made on the process for demarcating the lands in question or, if not, if a deadline has been set for such a decision to be made. After this 10-day deadline and 10 additional days for the parties to pronounce themselves on any possible agreements, she will issue her sentence on the possessory action.

 

The leaders filed the comments they made during the hearing held at the Ministry of Justice in Brasília and requested a hearing with minister Tarso Genro.

 

Traditional land

“The proposal made by the Aracruz Celulose company implied waiving a constitutionally unavailable right to the indigenous land and would have serious consequences for the future of the indigenous peoples,” the leaders said as they explained their refusal to accept the agreement in a note signed by the Committee of Tupinikim and Guarani Chiefs.

According to information posted on its website, the Aracruz company proposed “guidelines for an agreement with the indigenous communities.” The first point would be “the recognition, by all parties, that there are no indigenous lands (lands traditionally occupied by indigenous people) in the Aracruz region and that the areas occupied by the indigenous communities are indigenous reservations. For this reason, these indigenous reservations can only be expanded through expropriations”.

In the letter in which they explain why they did not attend the hearing, the Tupinikim and Guarani say that their communities, according to the Federal Constitution, cannot give up their lands and enter into agreements that imply any waiver of their right to lands traditionally occupied by them.

As they explained why they disagreed with the proposal from Aracruz, the indigenous people also reaffirmed their decision to wait until the administrative procedure for demarcating Tupinikim and Guarani lands is completed. The process was referred back to Funai by the Ministry of Justice while Márcio Tomaz Bastos was still the minister of Justice.

 

 

HUMAN RIGHTS COMMITTEE DISCUSSES ESTREITO HYDROELECTRIC POWER PLANT IN PALMAS

The Human Rights and Minorities Committee of the Chamber of Representatives held a public hearing in Palmas, state of Tocantins, on May 28 to discuss two projects that will have negative impacts on indigenous lands located in the state: a project to build the Estreito hydroelectric power plant and irrigation projects in the Dois Rios Farm, near the Bananal Island.

 

The indigenous leaders who attended the hearing reaffirmed that they don’t want the hydroelectric power plant to be built. They also questioned the fact that the Brazilian Institute for the Environment (Ibama) authorized the beginning of the project without a previous environmental impact study to determine the consequences of building the dam for their lands and indigenous peoples in the region.

 

Their concerns led to a Public Civil Action filed by the Indianist Missionary Council (Cimi) and the Association for the Development and Preservation of the Araguaia and Tocantins Rivers (Adeprato), as a result of which federal judge Lucas Rosendo determined, in April, that the project for building the hydroelectric power plant was to be suspended. 

 

The indigenous people requested the president of the Human Rights Committee, representative Luiz Couto, to hold a new hearing on the topic in Brasília with the presence of the presidents of Ibama and of the Brazilian Electricity Regulatory Agency and of representatives from the Ministry of Mines and Energy and of other agencies.

 

Heavy pressure

 

The Vale do Rio Doce company threatens to postpone investments in aluminium and nickel from 2012 onward if the preliminary order which led to the suspension of the project to build the power plant in Estreito is not withdrawn in 20 days, according to information disseminated today in the newspapers Folha de São Paulo and O Globo.

 

The company, which is the second largest mining company in the world, is directly interested in the electricity that will be produced by the Estreito power plant, if it is actually built. Besides consuming the electricity generated by the plant, the company is a member of the consortium that would build the plant, which is also made up of the Alcoa, Bilinton Metais, Camargo Corrêa and Tractebel companies.

 

During the 3rd Globo News Forum, a meeting organized by that cable TV company to discuss “economic growth challenges,” the chairman of the Vale do Rio Doce company, Roger Agnelli, said that the investments are limited by a possible lack of electricity in the next decade.

 

Dois Rios Farm

 

With regard to the construction of canals for irrigating the Dois Rios Farm using waters from the Javaé and Formoso rivers, the Federal Prosecutor’s Office in the state of Tocantins reported that it will file a lawsuit requesting the federal (and not the state) environmental agency, Ibama, to carry out the required environmental impact study to asses the impacts of the project on indigenous lands. The indigenous communities believe that the project will reduce the water available in the rivers and pose environmental contamination risks, with impacts for the Karajá and Javaé peoples who live on the Bananal Island and on the Krahô-Kanela people.

 

The hearings were held with the support from Cimi’s office in the state of Tocantins, which ensured the presence of representatives of social movements and took care of the transportation of leaders of the Apinajé,Krahô, Krahô-Kanela, Javaé, Karajá Xambioá, Xerente and Karajá peoples from their areas to the site of the hearings. Representatives of the Federal Prosecutor’s Office and of civil society organizations also attended the hearings.

 

 

 

Brasília, May 31, 2007

Cimi – Indianist Missionary Council

www.cimi.org.br