CAPOIB - Council for the Articulation of Indigenous Peoples and
Organizations of Brazil and the Forum in Defense of Indigenous Rights
publicly denounce the arbitrary decisions of President Fernando
Henrique and of his right-hand man, the Minister for Justice, Nelson
Jobim.
Since March 1995, the Fernando Henrique administration,
representing anti-indigenous groups, has been announcing its intention
to change Decree 22 of the 4th of February 1991, which regulates the
demarcation of indigenous lands. Purporting to defend the principles
of democracy, the government sanctioned the new Decree n. 1.775 of the
8th of January 1996 providing for the principle of the adversary
system and for the right to an ample defence, retreating from the
obligation to protect the indigenous heritage and allowing interest
parties to invalidate the demarcation of all indigenous areas that
have not been officially registered yet.
In this way, the government has thrown away millions of dollars
invested in the demarcation of indigenous lands, which came from
agreements signed abroad.
The new Decree allows Brazilian states and municipalities and
other parties with vested interests in indigenous lands to challenge
and oppose the limits defined by the official government agency. By
allowing this possibility and not having any lawsuit or accusation
within the administrative proceedings to be resolved, the federal
administration resorted to a false judicial justification to base its
ideological proposal to jeopardize the constitutional principle
outlined in Article 231, according to which ethnical and cultural
diversity is to be respected.
This new administrative procedure provides grounds to and
officializes old and illegitimate pretensions of reducing the limits
of indigenous lands to be demarcated. Thus, the physical space
necessary for the survival and growth of ethnical and cultural
diversity is undermined.
We are very worried about this, because the publication of this
ill-conceived Decree is already having tragic consequences on
virtually all indigenous lands and their populations, except those
officially registered. We are frightened also by some interpretations
of the Decree that raise doubts about lands already registered.
After the publication of the Decree, the Sattin S/A Agroindustrial
company of the state of Mato Grosso do Sul filed a lawsuit to claim
the Gurani-Kaiowa area, where many cases of violence, ranging from
assassinations to suicides, have been registered because of the
insufficient land space available to its population. On the 10th of
January, the government of the state of Bahia also filed a suit to
expropriat the Coroa Vermelha indigenous area, of the Pataxo people,
located in the extreme south of the state.
During all of last year, we warned that the new Decree would
provoke the invasion of indigenous lands. This is already occurring in
the Barao de Antonina (Kaingang people) indigenous land, located in
the state of Parana.
These are only the first signs of what can happen to indigenous
peoples in the future under the present regime.
Therefore, we demand the immediate invalidation of Decree 1.775/96
and make President Fernando Henrique and the Minister for Justice,
Nelson Jobim, responsible for every piece of land robbed from
indigenous peoples, for every drop of indigenous blood that falls to
the ground at the hands of assassin gunmen hired by landowners, timber
companies, distilleries, businessmen, mining companies, municipalities,
states and other political and economic interests.
Brasilia-DF, 17th of January, 1996
CAPOIB - Council for the Articulation of Indigenous Peoples and
Organizations of Brazil
and
Forum in Defence of Indigenous Rights