Landless On The Move

May 2000 – 7’30’’

0’01’’

The landless are on the move. For the ethnic Indian population of Brazil, land is sacred, not just a home, but the source of life itself.

They are marching to the capital to demand what is rightly theirs.

I/V 0’16’’

Member of Brazilian Landless Movement:

0:17

We are protesting against the government’s 500 year celebrations of their massacre of the Indian peoples of Brazil. A lot of small farmers and peasants have died fighting for their land. Indian leaders have been killed during the government’s forced expropriations. We have had enough. We are demanding justice for our people, and we want to be heard.

0’46’’

The issue of land rights in Brazil has been fraught since colonial times. 45 percent of the land belongs to one percent of the population, although the Indians have tilled the land for centuries.

In 1996 President Cardoso signed a decree allowing Indian land demarcations to be challenged, which has led to mass expropriations and hardship.

Brazil’s peasants, already organised within christian farming communities, joined forces to found the Movement of Landless Rural Workers 10 years ago, with the aim of achieving land reform. They now have over a million members.

I/V

1’25’’

Union leader from Belo Horizonte

We are demanding land to work on, as well as pay and jobs, as unemployment is very high. For every household of five, there is only one breadwinner. And every firm that is privatised by the government has to make several employees redundant. So we’re demanding an end to privatisation and redundancies.

1:52

Under Brazilian law, land automatically becomes the property of those who occupy and work it after 10 years.

Here, near the small town of Piracicaba, 1200 families set up camp to stake their claim on this fallow land. Just as they were hoping to replace their simple tents with more permanent wooden huts, the original landowners turned up and evicted them.

As is often the case, the military police were involved, leading to violent clashes.

INSERT: Luisina Ferreira da Silva

Land squatter from Amazonia

2:27

We’ve had to move around everywhere - from a camp in San Carlos to Castelo Branco, then to Porto Feliz and on to Ahenbi - and this is where we’ve ended up.

2’40’’

This man is one of many city dwellers who have joined the movement.We asked him whether he’d moved from camp to camp too.

2.49

I/V

> INSERT: Darcy Oliveira Rodriguez

> city dweller from Campinhas

I used to work for Mercedes Benz but I was made redundant 6 years ago when they moved the plant out of Campinhas. I was unemployed for a while - I wa fed up of being at home and out of work all day. When this movement was founded, a lot of my friends joined it, so I decided that I would too.

3.13

So the landless people no longer consist solely of farmers and peasants but also the urban poor who can no longer cope with life in Brazil’s cities. The minimum wage of US $4 a day is often earned in slave-like conditions on sugar cane plantations and alcohol distilleries. Land offers the only real alternative for a decent life.

3.34

We asked this camp co-ordinator where she would rather live - on the outskirts of Sao Paulo or here in the camp

3.43

I/V

> INSERT: Marta dos Santos da Silva

> Camp Coordinator, Piracicaba

I’d rather be here in the camp where we have our peace and quiet. You don’t get that in the city -everyone is too busy rushing around. We’re afraid in the city as well. During the day we just get on with our business as usual and it’s OK, but at night there’s nearly always a gang shooting on the way home. The city has become really dangerous - I certainly don’t feel safe there anymore.

4.15

Violence, however is not just a city phenomenon. On 15th April 1996 military police opened fire on over a thousand landless people from El Dorado, killing 19 and injuring 40. Local doctors report that some demonstrators had been shot in the back at close range, suggesting executions.

The officers responsible for the massacre were only brought to trial in August last year. In cases where squatters have been killed, abused or tortured by the military police, they can expect rough justice, and are lucky if the president even bothers to send along an investigator.

The 3 day trial treated the landless with little sympathy and did not soften the racist prejudice of the Brazilian middle class towards them.

5’03’’

Hundreds of activists gathered in fronts of the court buildings to protest. A local TV film contradicted police reports that the demonstrators had shot first, and they are outraged at the blatant travesty of justice.

Although the government has promised them land, redistribution continues to be thwarted by judges and the military police supporting large landowners.

The demonstrators are angry, but peaceful - they are also there to honour the dead.

(shot of plice lined up holding truncheons ready)

But of course the military police are standing by, ready to deal with the protesters as they see fit - safe in the knowledge that all measures will be seen as ‘due restraint’.

5.40

The judge’s verdict is read out - not guilty. All of the police officers are acquitted. As the main defendant is led out under police protection, cries of ‘murder!’ surround him.

(shot of protesters holding another one back)

This time it is the demonstrators themselves who exercise restraint, narrowly avoiding further bloodshed.

For the landless, this was just further evidence that Brazil’ s courts are biased against them. Their leaders want to be better prepared for the second trial which is about to follow.

> 6'20"

> INSERT: Joao Pedro Stedile

> General coordinator of the Landless Movement MST

>

We’re a social organisation, and we need to increase social pressure to widen our support base.We know that society at large - not just us - is outraged by this verdict.

Our best response to it is to improve our organisation of the rural poor and to push forwardwith our programme of squatting land.

Occupying undeveloped land puts pressure on the government and enables us to weaken their economic and political power.

6’53

So the landless marches and demonstrations are continuing to achieve this. They are squatting land all over the country to mark the government’s 500 year celebrations.

Court buildings are being stormed to demand real justice and human rights.

The odds are against them - the government have provided no infrastructure for the little difficult terrain it has handed over, yet there is no doubt that the landless of Brazil are on the move - and making a difference.

7.30 end insert