Situation of Indigenous Peoples in Mato Grosso do Sul slide image

Situation of Indigenous Peoples in Mato Grosso do Sul

INDIGENIST MISSIONARY COUNCIL - CIMI teme Distributing themselves in small nuclei consisting of one or more kinship groups, under the leadership of the nanderu or tekoharuvicha, leaders of a markedly religious character, whose power was supported in the prestige bestowed by their kinship group, capacity of convincement and generosity and not in force or physical ability. Guarani identity remits, directly, to the idea of belonging and to kinship relations. Between the years 1915 and 1928, the Federal Government demarcated eight reduced and dispersed extensions of land for Guarani and Kaiowá occupation, bringing the total to only 18,124 hectares. It is important to note that with the demarcation of these eight reserves, more than guaranteeing Guarani and Kaiowá lands, the government objective was to free-up lands for colonization, also already being concerned about the occupation of the borders. The reserves demarcated by the SPI further constituted an important strategy of disorganization of indigenous economic and social organization and subsequent submission to the projects of occupation and exploration of natural resources by non- indigenous fronts. Ignored in the demarcation of these reserves were the indigenous patterns of relationship with the territory and its natural resources and, primarily, their social organization. The historical process of territorial reduction and confinement interior to the small extensions of the Kaiowá and Guarani land reserves, generated innumerable changes in their daily lives, especially creating new challenges for their social organization. This is pointed out by researchers and indigenous representatives as cause of the innumerable problems they experience today, particularly the problems of violence and exacerbation of the practice of suicide. Confinement and overpopulation within the reserves reduced available space, causing exhaustion of natural resources important for quality of life in a Guarani and Kaiowá village and compromised indigenous agriculture. With sustainability made profoundly precarious for the indigenous peoples located in them, they became increasingly dependent on food security policies of the government and on the provision of external resources. Peoples were transformed from centuries of producing foods not only sufficient but abundant, as historical documents attest. Today they are dependent on being supplied with basic food baskets and all sorts of external aid. Peoples who were an important work force and contributed to the establishment of a large part of the agricultural, livestock and public enterprises such as railroads and streets, in Mato Grosso do Sul, today can no longer provide subsistence for themselves and their children. But in addition to the consequences for the indigenous economy, this process of confinement created problems for their social organization, obliging scores of villages, previously autonomous, to seek shelter in the reserves demarcated by the SPI. To administer these "bringing together" of indians and villages, the figure of the 'captain' was created. Indigenous leaders more familiar with the western way of life, these were arbitrarily nominated and the maximum leaders interior to these spaces. To aid them in the exercise of power and to maintain order, over whom no one had any power, were the indigenous police. In this way, these macro- familial groups, in addition to having to coexist with other groups having to dispute small portions of land being increasingly reduced, they had to submit to the authority of foreign leadership. It is important to highlight that in the confinement process that brought the installation of Evangelical schools and churches in the indigenous communities - Missão Kaiowá arrived in 1928, a period 26
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