By Lígia Apel, from the Norte 1 regional communications office in Cimi

In solidarity and support for the Mura people of the region of Autazes and Careiro da Várzea, in Amazonas, 48 ​​civil society organizations expressed, in a press release, their opposition to the process of installing the Potássio mining company do Brasil. The company is a subsidiary of Canadian commercial bank Forbes & Manhattan and focuses on the indigenous territory of the Mura people, which is currently being demarcated.

In 2013, the Potássio do Brasil company began drilling wells for potash exploration without the appropriate consultation protocol that must be established for prior, free and informed consultation with the indigenous populations of the directly affected and adjacent areas. Demanding that the process be respected, the Mura people filed a request with the Federal Public Prosecutor’s Office, which obtained its agreement, for the project to be stopped and the consultation process to begin.

In 2013, the Potássio do Brasil company began drilling wells for potassium exploration without the proper consultation protocol.

However, the pressure exerted on the Mura by the company and politicians interested in the company, very profitable, “is strong and in bad faith”, affirms the note from the indigenous and indigenist entities.

“Last September, the local press reported on the alleged support of the Mura people for the mining exploration project on their lands by the company Potássio do Brasil. The announcement was celebrated and taken up by the state governor, the president of Potassio and state deputies linked to mining on indigenous lands,” the note begins, then informing that the leaders of Mura disagree with the company. The organizations “stated that they did not agree with any issue approved behind their backs, without either the village or Tuxaua being informed.”

The memo alerts leaders to the complaint that, during a meeting of Potássio do Brasil with indigenous peoples, there was bad faith, false information and promises of benefits, in a clear attempt to co-opt the leaders in order to make them favorable to the project.

The organizations “stated that they did not agree with any issue approved behind their backs, without either the village or Tuxaua being informed.”

The leaders “denounce the bad faith actions of the President of Potassio during the meeting which would have resulted in the announced support of the people of Mura, claiming that throughout the speech, the businessman transmitted false information, promising benefits to communities and that the President himself requested a modification of the consultation protocol with the Mura people,” they warn.

The memo also outlines the complaint that key executives are succumbing to harassment by the company. “Key leaders have been and are being co-opted, and are even threatened, by politicians and other Indigenous leaders who are at the forefront of this pro-mining movement. We are against mining in our territory, because for us, mining is death,” they reaffirm in the document.

“Key leaders have been and are being co-opted, they are even threatened”

Due to the resistance of the Mura people to the clear and unjust strategy of co-optation and weakening of the indigenous Mura movement, civil society organizations are joining their struggle.

“Faced with the resistance of the Mura people to harassment, co-optation and disloyalty on the part of those who represent economic and political power in the Amazon, indigenous organizations, indigenistas and other civil society organizations and collectives join to the resistance of these people and take a stand alongside the leaders who are fighting to ensure that deaths caused by mining do not take place on their territory.

The organizations reaffirm, in the note, that they are united in the resistance and send their message to the Mura people: “we express our solidarity with the Mura leaders who are resisting harassment and threats and we ask for the protection of their lives in danger . the face of resistance to the interests of the powerful. We affirm: the Mura who resist are not alone! We unite, fight and insist with you so that the project of death – as you have denounced it – is stopped and that the territory of the Mura people becomes a free and delimited land again,” he concludes.

Read the note in its entirety.