News about the struggle for land in Brazil
Featured image: rubble in the Revolutionary Area Renato Nathan. Source: A Nova Democracia
We share some news on the struggle for land in Brazil that we have found in the newspaper to A Nova Democracia.
War climate in Messias, Alagoas; LCP actions against Usina Usina Leão
We previously reported about the criminal attack by the latifundium against the peasants of Messias, who were brutally attacked on October 22 and more than 720 peasant families were left with nothing.
The repression still continues. There is a video broadcast on social networks where can be seen looted crops and a market in the region has been set to fire. In addition, an old man has died when he fell from a moving truck while moving his belongings after the destruction of his homes.
The Support Committee states that the operation has been done as revenge against the League of Poor Peasants for its firm victory in the battle of Barro Branco. The LCP was in Messias for 15 years and where the revolutionary area Renato Nathan was founded.
Since then, the LCP and other democratic organizations have continued denouncing of the Usina Usina Leão actions.
Indigenous march against Temporary Framework
Amid the sharpening of the struggle for the land, such as the Guarani-Kaiowá in Mato Grosso do Sul, the Avá-Guaraní in Terra Roxa (Pernambuco) or the battle of Barro Branco and the developments in Messias itself, new protests have been made in different parts of Brazil against the Temporary Framework.
In Brasilia 400 peasants marched from the Square of the Ministries to the Square of the Three Powers against the Temporary Framework. In Maranhão several highways were cut between the cities of Matinha and Viana. There were also protests against the Grão Paraá-Maranhão entrepreneurship, port terminal project in Quilombola territory and a 520 Kim railway that would cut indigenous and Quilombola territories. These projects have not been approved yet. Also, indigenous people from the lands of Raposa Serra do Sol and São Marcos blocked kilometer 666 of the Federal Highway B-174.
We have previously reported on the Temporary framework, you can find more information here.
Students discuss the Agrarian Revolution
On October 25, the debate “Agrarian Revolution: the actuality of the fight for Earth in Brazil” was carried out by the Grassroots Collective – Honestino Guimarães (CB-HG) at the University of Brasília.
First, a CB-HG intervention was made about the struggle for land in Brazil, how is a not solved and secular problem, as well as they presented the relationship between indigenous, Quilombola and peasant strugle, whose common enemy is the latifundium, at the service of imperialism, and that it can only be defeated with the Agrarian Revolution. Images of the battle of Barro Branco were shown to demonstrate the true tensions between peasants and big landlords and the LCP statement about it was read out.
After that an activist of the People’s Women’s Movement (MFP) remarked the importance of women in the struggle, setting the example of the peasant and the student who received shots during the battle of Barro Branco. “This resistance is an example for our region, which despite being in the capital of the country, at 30 kilometers we find latifundia next too the city,” she said. They also discussed about the displacement of peasants who are forced to move to the big cities in the face of land grabbing and the violence by the latifundium, putting the example of the workers who work in the dump.
Several students showed a lot of interest in the event: a student denounced the invisibility of press monopolies on the situation at the countryside, and how revisionists and opportunists ignore those struggles, adding that “the LCP statement shows us the way to follow ”. Another student highlighted the historical role of oppression and repression of the masses of the countryside at the hands of the latifundium, and that despite all the new technologies implemented in the countryside, the relations of production are semi-feudal and even “similar relations to slavery.”
Finally, it was showed how the struggle of the peasant squatters led by the LCP managed to achieve the first defeat of the Invasão Zero movement. It was said that “it is our duty, as young people, to echo this struggle that develops in the field, spreading the agrarian revolution as a way to a new and true democracy in Brazil.”
