Brazil: Peasants occupy a Latifundium of 1,7 thousand hectares in Triunfo
We hereby share an unofficial translation of an article of A Nova Democracia.
More than 400 peasant families, organized by the Movement of Rural Landless Workers (MST) occupied on the 10th of April a latifundium of 1,7 thousand hectares in the city of Triunfo, about 70 km away of the capital Porto Alegre. The land has been property of the now privatized CEEE Transmission, nevertheless its structures that had relations to the electric energy transmission, have been abandoned and the terrain has been used for the cultivation of eucalyptus trees.
The MST is claiming this place for the agrarian reform. In an interview with a press monopoly
a member of the State coordination of the MST said that the occupation is result of the vacillation of the government to resettle the families that had lost their lodges due to the destruction by the flooding in May 2024. The leader also denounced also the situation of more then 1,6 thousand families, that been camping in the whole state, waiting more then 10 years to be settled by the Incra.
This action is only one of dozens of other occupations led by the MST in the framework of the “Red April”, and happened during a general offensive of the paramilitaries and the far right in leniency with the Military Police (MP) against the poor peasants’ struggle. The 9th of April, paramilitaries invaded the area Gedeon José Duque, in Machadinho D’Oeste (Rondônia). Already in March, the Union of Communities in Struggle denounced the leniency of the latifundium with the jurisdictional power of the state of Maranhão, with the purpose to take over the land and repress the peasants struggle.
These attacks by the goons, get nurtured by the politicians and big entrepreneurs. Peasants of Rondônia assure to AND that the chief of the attack against the area Gedeon José Duque, is the criminal Gesulino Tavares, who is supported by Bolsonarist politicians and a tycoon. Meanwhile, reactionary politicians like Ronaldo Caido (governor of Goiás), Jorginho Mello (governor of Santa Catarina) and Romeu Zema (governor of Minas Gerais), have put in action the “Green April” and the “Yellow and Green April” against the “Red April”. The movement, that has been summoned “in the name of the private property”, serves the stimulation of the attacks of the paramilitary hordes of the far right against the poor peasants in struggle.
