Prominent Brazil leader of struggle for land shot by armed militias of big landlords

By Harsh Thakor*

The member of the National Direction of the National Front of Struggle – Countryside and City (FNL), Geraldo Pires de Oliveira, of 52 years old, was the victim of a shooting attack in the municipality of Pirapora, in Minas Gerais. The man was struck in the hand while riding a motorcycle and is hospitalized. Geraldinho., He was a prominent leader of the struggle for land in the region and had previously suffered threats and kidnappings from goons and police.

The ambush took place after Geraldo left the Camp Farm Prata, one of the FNL’s occupation sites in the state of Minas Gerais.

In a statement , the FNL stated that he “reaffirms his commitment to continue the struggle for the land” and that “this attack is one of the many carried out by the armed militias of big landlords against the leaders of landless workers, pastors and trade unionists”.

The Camp Farm Prata is one of the FNL’s occupation sites in the State of Minas Gerais. Before being occupied by peasants, the farm was paralysed in term sof productivity. The lands were mortgaged more than 20 years ago due to amassing of unpaid debts, and currently is the property of the State.

This does not stop threats and persecution against peasants and leaders who occupy the land. In June 2023, Geraldo was kidnapped by military police and accused of being the leader of land occupations in the region. The FNL condemned the case as part of the pro-latifundia tirade of the Military Police in collaboration with the goons.

“Everyone is aware that the farms in the region work with armed militias, that is, military police officers who do so-called “odd jobs”, when on their days off, they go to work […] for the big landlords”, said the statement.

The attack committed in the first days of 2024 continued the road of other serious attacks on the masses, activists and leaders of the struggle for land of last year, a manifestation of the resurrection of the struggle for land in the country.

The first month of 2023 was also marked by attacks of this type, which took the lives of three peasants in January alone. They were Patrick Gasparini, Raniel Laurindo and Rodrigo Hawerroth.

The tendency prevailed throughout the year, with new murders, torture, invasions and intimidation against peasants, indigenous people, quilombolas and other masses struggling for land in the country, a routine phenomenan. With the escalation of these conflicts, organizations such as the League of Poor Peasants (LCP) issued a statement calling on peasants to form self-defence armed groups to resist the attacks by goons.

Peasants also exhibited relentless spirit to maintain the struggle for land in the form of new occupations and defence of lands already taken. From February to December, land seizures or important gatherings to defend the occupied territories were undertaken from the North to the South of the Country, in a movement that is expected to intensify in the coming months.

The League of Poor Peasants of the North of Minas and South of Bahia, and the National Commission of the Leagues of Poor Peasants of Brazil, in no uncertain terms the cowardly shooting attack against comrade Geraldo Pires, dear Geraldinho, national leader of the National Front of Struggle – Countryside and City (FNL), as well as a regional leader with combative activity in the North of Minas, mainly Pirapora, in the struggle for the lands of the former Farm Prata latifundium. The big landowners and the shameless extreme right, which, backed by the bayonets of corrupt generals, as well as these state military police that impart devices to murder poor people and black people, were responsible for tanother heinous crime.

All over Brazil, gangs of big landlords and gunmen, are always patronised by the local military police, with repossession orders distributed everywhere by this rotten justice system – or even without this fake paper –, attack peasants, indigenous people and quilombolas, struggling for their lands or territories. All this is endorsed by extreme right-wing governors, and deputies of all kinds.

---

*Freelance journalist

Comments

Urgent need to study cause of large number of natural deaths in Gulf countries

By Venkatesh Nayak* According to data tabled in Parliament in April 2018, there are 87.76 lakh (8.77 million) Indians in six Gulf countries, namely Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates (UAE). While replying to an Unstarred Question (#6091) raised in the Lok Sabha, the Union Minister of State for External Affairs said, during the first half of this financial year alone (between April-September 2018), blue-collared Indian workers in these countries had remitted USD 33.47 Billion back home. Not much is known about the human cost of such earnings which swell up the country’s forex reserves quietly. My recent RTI intervention and research of proceedings in Parliament has revealed that between 2012 and mid-2018 more than 24,570 Indian Workers died in these Gulf countries. This works out to an average of more than 10 deaths per day. For every US$ 1 Billion they remitted to India during the same period there were at least 117 deaths of Indian Workers in Gulf ...

A comrade in culture and controversy: Yao Wenyuan’s revolutionary legacy

By Harsh Thakor* This year marks two important anniversaries in Chinese revolutionary history—the 20th death anniversary of Yao Wenyuan, and the 50th anniversary of his seminal essay "On the Social Basis of the Lin Biao Anti-Party Clique". These milestones invite reflection on the man whose pen ignited the first sparks of the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution and whose sharp ideological interventions left an indelible imprint on the political and cultural landscape of socialist China.

India's health workers have no legal right for their protection, regrets NGO network

Counterview Desk In a letter to Union labour and employment minister Santosh Gangwar, the civil rights group Occupational and Environmental Health Network of India (OEHNI), writing against the backdrop of strike by Bhabha hospital heath care workers, has insisted that they should be given “clear legal right for their protection”.

Uttarakhand tunnel disaster: 'Question mark' on rescue plan, appraisal, construction

By Bhim Singh Rawat* As many as 40 workers were trapped inside Barkot-Silkyara tunnel in Uttarkashi after a portion of the 4.5 km long, supposedly completed portion of the tunnel, collapsed early morning on Sunday, Nov 12, 2023. The incident has once again raised several questions over negligence in planning, appraisal and construction, absence of emergency rescue plan, violations of labour laws and environmental norms resulting in this avoidable accident.

History, culture and literature of Fatehpur, UP, from where Maulana Hasrat Mohani hailed

By Vidya Bhushan Rawat* Maulana Hasrat Mohani was a member of the Constituent Assembly and an extremely important leader of our freedom movement. Born in Unnao district of Uttar Pradesh, Hasrat Mohani's relationship with nearby district of Fatehpur is interesting and not explored much by biographers and historians. Dr Mohammad Ismail Azad Fatehpuri has written a book on Maulana Hasrat Mohani and Fatehpur. The book is in Urdu. He has just come out with another important book, 'Hindi kee Pratham Rachna: Chandayan' authored by Mulla Daud Dalmai.' During my recent visit to Fatehpur town, I had an opportunity to meet Dr Mohammad Ismail Azad Fatehpuri and recorded a conversation with him on issues of history, culture and literature of Fatehpur. Sharing this conversation here with you. Kindly click this link. --- *Human rights defender. Facebook https://www.facebook.com/vbrawat , X @freetohumanity, Skype @vbrawat

Job opportunities decreasing, wages remain low: Delhi construction workers' plight

By Bharat Dogra* It was about 32 years back that a hut colony in posh Prashant Vihar area of Delhi was demolished. It was after a great struggle that the people evicted from here could get alternative plots that were not too far away from their earlier colony. Nirmana, an organization of construction workers, played an important role in helping the evicted people to get this alternative land. At that time it was a big relief to get this alternative land, even though the plots given to them were very small ones of 10X8 feet size. The people worked hard to construct new houses, often constructing two floors so that the family could be accommodated in the small plots. However a recent visit revealed that people are rather disheartened now by a number of adverse factors. They have not been given the proper allotment papers yet. There is still no sewer system here. They have to use public toilets constructed some distance away which can sometimes be quite messy. There is still no...

Women's rights leaders told to negotiate with Muslimness, as India's donor agencies shun the word Muslim

By A Representative Former vice-president Hamid Ansari has sharply criticized donor agencies engaged in nongovernmental development work, saying that they seek to "help out" marginalizes communities with their funds, but shy away from naming Muslims as the target group, something, he insisted, needs to change. Speaking at a book release function in Delhi, he said, since large sections of Muslims are poor, they need political as also social outreach.

Warning bells for India: Tribal exploitation by powerful corporate interests may turn into international issue

By Ashok Shrimali* Warning bells are ringing for India. Even as news drops in from Odisha that Adivasi villages, one after another, are rejecting the top UK-based MNC Vedanta's plea for mining, a recent move by two senior scholars Felix Padel and Samarendra Das suggests the way tribals are being exploited in India by powerful international and national business interests may become an international issue. In fact, one has only to count days when things may be taken up at the United Nations level, with India being pushed to the corner. Padel, it may be recalled, is a major British authority on indigenous peoples across the world, with several scholarly books to his credit.

Gujarat Bitcoin scam worth Rs 5,000 crore "linked" with BJP leaders: Need for Supreme Court monitored probe

By Shaktisinh Gohil* BJP hit a jackpot in the form of demonetisation, which it used as an alibi to convert black money into white in Gujarat. Even as party scrambles for answers of how the Ahmedabad District Cooperative Bank (ADCB), whose director is BJP president Amit Shah, received old currency worth Rs 745.58 crore in just five days, and how Rs 3118.51 crore was deposited in 11 district cooperative banks linked with Gujarat BJP leaders, a new mega Bitcoin scam, worth more than Rs 5,000 crore has been unraveled.

Counterview

Search This Blog