Brazil: Landless Workers Movement occupies unproductive lands in Bahia and Rio Grande do Norte

Brazil’s Landless Rural Workers Movement (MST) occupied during the day on Wednesday the workshop of the Ligas da Bahia Iron Company (Ferbasa) in Maracás, in the state of Bahia.

The protest and force took place after some of the families occupying land owned by the company in the municipality of Planaltino, in the Chapada Diamantina region, were evicted on Thursday last week, and no solution has yet been found.

The farmers have occupied Ferbasa’s land since March 30, the third attempt to build the Estrela Vive camp there.

According to the MST, the area was abandoned and unproductive.

During the eviction, the MST stated that the families did not attend to where they would go and “fought to conquer the land.”

According to statements by the political articulator of the MST in Chapada Diamantina, Abraão Brito, “the MST occupies the workshop (of Ferbasa) claiming that there is a meeting between the company, Incra, the federal and the state governments to pacify this situation since there was an agreement in 2017 that this company would cede several hectares of land to settle families in the region that was never fulfilled.”

This is not the only action underway: in the Chapada region, in the city of Boa Vista do Tupim, 130 families have been on occupied land since the early hours of Saturday morning at the Boa Esperança Farm.

According to the MST, the area “has been abandoned for 18 years and has an extension of 1,300 hectares of unproductive land”.

Over the weekend, members of the movement also occupied three areas in Rio Grande do Norte.

In Macaíba, in the capital’s metropolitan region, 70 families from the Zumbi dos Palmares Brigade occupied an assembly area on Friday night.

The MST actions in Bahia and Rio Grande do Norte are part of the 26th National Day of Struggles in Defense of Agrarian Reform.

This year’s Red April has as its slogan “Against Hunger and Slavery: for Land, Democracy and the Environment”.

In addition to the struggle for access to land, the MST’s occupations, marches, and vigils also denounce violence in the countryside.

With information from Telesurtv

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