Brazilian Indian killed next to roadside camp
July 8, 2011
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A Guarani man in Brazil has been run over and killed by a bus on the highway next to which his community has been camped for almost a decade.
The Guarani of Apyka’y community are living in appalling conditions next to a highway, having been evicted from their ancestral land which is now occupied by an ethanol factory.
Vehicles thunder past day and night, threatening to run Guarani over, especially children as they play outside their make-shift houses.
The man’s nine year old daughter said, ‘My father cannot be crushed like that on the road, like an armadillo or a dog. We want justice. Without justice, we children will die one by one on this road’.
The São Fernando ethanol factory has reportedly prevented the man’s family from burying him on their ancestral land.
The man’s brother said, ‘My brother’s body will wait as long as is necessary. We are going to bury him on our land, for which he fought and died. He died in the fight for our ancestral land … and there he will be buried’.
The Brazilian authorities are responsible for mapping out the tribe’s lands, but this program has come to a near-standstill as ranchers and politicians oppose returning land to the Guarani.
Meanwhile, thousands of Guarani are living in overcrowded reserves or roadside camps as their land has been stolen from them for ranching and soya and sugarcane production. The sugarcane is turned into ethanol, to be used as a bio-fuel.
Three Guarani from another community, Laranjeira Nanderu, were run over and killed when they were living on the roadside. Last month, the Guarani of this community reoccupied their ancestral land in an act of desperation.
