Latest News in the Struggle for Land in Brazil
Featured image: Event celebrates the 31st anniversary of the Heroic Peasant Resistance of Corumbiara. Source: AND
We hereby share some updates on the struggle for land and the ongoing Agrarian Revolution in Brazil, based on the latest “New Brazil Bulletin,” published by A Nova Democracia (AND) on August 18.
Rondônia – 31 years later, survivors reaffirm the Heroic Peasant Resistance of Corumbiara
In an event titled “From Santa Elina to the Present Day,” peasants, people’s lawyers, teachers, students, and popular organizations held an event in Porto Velho to commemorate the 31st anniversary of the Heroic Peasant Resistance of Corumbiara.
Elias, a survivor from the Battle of Santa Elina, stated that 31 years later, the struggle continues, and that the peasants will continue until they conquer the land and destroy the latifundium through the Agrarian Revolution. Felipe Nicolau, president of The Brazilian Association of People’s Lawyers (ABRAPO), recalled that José Hélio Cysneiros Pachá, the official held responsible by the peasants for the 1995 operation and acquitted by the old State’s court system, was later tried by the People’s Court against latifundium crimes in Rondônia. “The sentence was categorical: the lands of Rondônia belong to the peoples of the land,” stated the president of ABRAPO./custom html
Pernambuco – Families’ resistance forces reversal of eviction order in the Old Sugarcane Mill
More than 70 peasant families from the old sugarcane mill Fervedouro, in Jaqueira, in the Mata Sul region of Pernambuco – who have lived and worked on the land for more than 80 years – began the week under threat of eviction after the 11th Federal Court ordered the repossession of the entire property and authorized police support to enforce the order.
The decision affected 213,955 hectares occupied by the families, in addition to houses, crops, a municipal school, churches, the association’s headquarters, and roads. Instead of abandoning the land, the community began meetings and announced that it would resist any eventual eviction – with their struggle in the end leading to the overturning of the eviction order and a victory in the struggle for land.
Maranhão – Peasant families in Bom Acerto reclaim and rebuild their land
Families in the Bom Acerto, in Balsas, southern Maranhão, have resumed the production of cassava, flour, and corn after acquiring approximately 70 hectares to rebuild their land. Houses have already been built, a well has been drilled, and a flour mill has begun operating, serving even peasants from neighboring lands who bring cassava for processing, AND reports.
This is the fruit of years of struggle, which sharpened in 2015 after a big landlord claimed his alleged ownership of their land. In 2020 an eviction operation was carried out against the peasants, with police officers, a bailiff, trucks, and tractors arriving to destroy houses, cassava fields, vegetable gardens, and water systems as well as evicting the peasants.
Even after the families returned, the attacks by landgrabbers on the peasants continued, with houses being lit on fire, destroying personal belongings and killing livestock. AND reports that: “That same year, an agreement guaranteed the families a new, undisputed arable area. This achievement allowed them to rebuild the community and recover production that includes cassava, corn, flour, buriti palm fruit, and pequi fruit.”
