Situation of Indigenous Peoples in Mato Grosso do Sul
INDIGENIST MISSIONARY COUNCIL - CIMI
tume
VIOLENCE AND RESISTANCE OF THE INDIGENOUS
PEOPLES OF ABYA YALA
Egon D. Heck 25
How Long?
"But how long are we going to see the flowers stepped on,
the birds killed and the blood spilled?
How long will we have to wait to be able to enter into our
grounds?
How long will we continue to be expulsed, confined,
discriminated against, murdered?"
(Letter of the Kaiowá Guarani
people in repudiation of the violence against the indigenous
peoples in Mato Grosso do Sul - November 2009)
Walking the path of the violence and resistance of the indigenous
peoples of the continent is, at the same time, a task of indignation
and gratification. The indignation at witnessing continuity of the
colonial processes more than five centuries old of invasion, pillaging,
violence, discrimination and genocide. Gratifying - in the abundant
encounters with the processes of heroic resistance, in a dynamic
of affirmation, construction and reconstruction of identities.
There are nearly one thousand distinct indigenous peoples with a
population greater than 40 million persons who are in Abya Yala
(the Americas), not only alive and militant, but demanding that
,
they be respected in their unique qualities, values, culture, social
economic and political organization. Their most visible banners
are demanding from the nation states the recognition of plurality,
autonomy, common laws, economies of reciprocity, their visions of
the world and their understandings of "Good Living".
While the declaration of the Organization of the American
States on indigenous rights continues to be postponed, the
fundamental rights of indigenous peoples - territorial, political
and cultural, are systematically violated by extractivist economic
policies, for imposition of which the exercise of indigenous rights
is criminalized.
This criminalization is expressed in the persecution by police
and judicial system of the indigenous leaders, the violent incursion
into the communities, the criminalization of their organizations
and in some countries even by means of kidnapping, torture, forced
disappearances and extrajudicial executions.
MATO GROSSO DO SUL - THE MOST VIOLENT STATE
AGAINST THE INDIANS
Since the demarcation of the eight confinements at the beginning
of the 20th century, which together total less than 20 thousand
hectares, nothing more was done in terms of demarcation of
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25 Indigenist, political scientist and CIMI MissionaryView entire presentation