Brazilian President promises to speed up demarcation of indigenous lands

The President of Brazil, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, promised yesterday, Monday, to accelerate the demarcation of Brazilian indigenous lands and remove all illegal miners.

The statement was made during the 52nd General Assembly of the Indigenous Peoples of Roraima, in the north of the country, after being informed by local leaders about the sanitary conditions and the threat of invaders on their lands.

“We have to try to quickly legalize all the lands where there are studies almost ready so that the indigenous people can occupy their territories, to increase their production capacity, and to help us take care of the climate,” Lula said.

In this way, he continued, it will be possible to demonstrate that “this world can produce food without having to cut down one more tree in the Amazon, without having to spoil one more river, without having to pollute the water”.

The demarcation is an exclusive competence of the executive power, according to the Brazilian Constitution, which considers the right of the indigenous peoples to the lands as original because they occupied them before the formation of the national State.

The demarcations were halted during former President Jair Bolsonaro’s (2019-2023) government.

Lula da Silva visited the northern states in January after the humanitarian crisis of the Yanomami people caused by the invasion of illegal miners in their territory became known.

The president said that the miners had “destroyed” the region’s rivers with mercury and that the government would have to withdraw water from artesian wells so that children could drink.

“We will remove the miners from all indigenous lands. Even if there is gold on indigenous lands, that gold does not belong to anyone,” and, therefore, Lula affirmed, “no one has the right to touch it without permission from those peoples, who are the true owners of those lands”.

In his opinion, “Brazilian society is becoming aware that the Brazilian indigenous peoples do not occupy any meter of anyone’s land in this country”.

The Brazilian president also promised to combat loggers’ actions and create lines of financing for agricultural production on indigenous lands.