One week after president Fernando Henrique Cardoso signed a decree
suspending the granting of licenses to exploit mahogany and virola (a
hardwood similar to mahogany) in Brazil for two years, the Brazilian press
denounced the existence of a half-billion-dollar timber project for
Malaysian timber companies and the payment of bribes to staff members of
the Brazilian Institute for Environment and Renewable Natural Resources
(Ibama). In the wake of the controversy, some people are saying that the
decree is aimed at suspending new contracts only, while other people say
it applies to all new and existing contracts. The aim of the government
was to prevent the degradation of the environment in the region, but the
decree ended up exposing a corrupted scheme of the mahogany mafia.
The bribe scandal was denounced by an entity called Friends of the
Earth International. The 500-page dossier prepared by the group and
delivered to the Brazilian government is based on a study on 10,000
documents kept in the files of Ibama, the Brazilian Agriculture/Livestock
Research Company (Embrapa), and Funai. It denounces that, in 1995, Ibama
staff members were receiving bribes of US$ 5,000 a month from timber
companies and charging US$ 20-40 thousand to issue licenses to cut down
mahogany trees. The president of Ibama, Eduardo Martins, admits there were
irregularities indeed. This year, 100,000 cubic meters of mahogany were
illegally traded in Brazil and abroad. Between 1982 and 1992, indigenous
lands lost over 2 billion cubic meters of that hardwood, equivalent to 250
truckloads a month. In 1987, half of the mahogany that was traded came
from the reservation of the Xikrin Indians, located in the state of Para'.
More than 3.5 thousand timber companies operate in that state.
About 470 square kilometers have been deforested in Amazonia, or 11.8%
of the whole region. According to Embrapa officials, if the deforesting
continues at its present pace, mahogany may become extinct in 30 years.
There are 3,040 timber projects in course in Amazonia. Ibama intends to
visit 1,010 of them to check whether the new rules are being complied
with.
INDIANS REPRESENT BRAZIL AT CONTINENTAL MEETING
Indians Amilton Lopes, from the Guarani-Kaiowa people, and Antonio
Pessoa Gomes (Caboquinho), from the Potiguara people, will represent
Brazil at the 1st Continental Indigenous Meeting "Visiones Abya Yala",
which will be held in Copenhagen, Denmark, from the 4th until the 10th of
August (Abya Yala means mature, flourishing land in the dialect of the
Kuna people from Costa Rica). The entities which organized the meeting
expect it to be attended by 60 Indians representing indigenous
organizations from the three Americas to discuss issues such as
Self-Determination, Indigenous lands and territories, Industrial property
rights, indigenous women, international cooperation, indigenous religion
and medicine, and the continental articulation of indigenous peoples.
Representing the Council for the Articulation of Indigenous Peoples and
Organizations of Brazil (Capoib), Caboquinho Potiguara will deliver a
document at the meeting reporting how the indigenous policy of the
Fernando Henrique Cardoso administration violates indigenous rights in
Brazil in some regards. The document denounces that Decree 1,775/96
delayed the demarcation of indigenous lands in Brazil, the decision of the
government to "restudy" the demarcation of certain territories, both
existing and in course, the lack of assistance to indigenous communities
and the illegal establishment of the Open Discovery Museum (MAD) in
Bahia.
Brasilia, 5 August 1996
Indianist Missionary Council - Cimi