February 20, 2022

09:02

Bruno Pacheco – from Cenarium Magazine

MANAUS – Known for being the “guardians” of a land coveted by illegal miners and mining companies seeking the region’s wealth in gold and iron, the Wajãpi denounced last Wednesday, 16, that the rivers that surround the Indigenous Land that bears their name, in western Amapá, are suffering from pollution. The case was reported in a statement issued by the Council of Wajãpi Villages – Apina, an organization that represents the indigenous people.

In the document, the organization reports that the Riozinho and Onça rivers have been suffering from changes in water quality since February 11 this year, caused by a mud whose origin was not identified. The organization says that it has received reports and images from indigenous people who live near the rivers, which has generated concern among local leaders and families.

“Photos and videos from various villages show the waters with a lot of mud and since we depend on the rivers to drink water and bathe, this has generated a lot of concern for our chiefs and families. During the weekend, the dirty water from the Onça river reached the Pairakae village, located in Felício river, a affluent of the Amapari. And the mud from the Riozinho reached the Riozinho village, next to the BR-210, in the Perimetral Norte settlement, in Pedra Branca do Amapari, where our settled neighbors were also very scared”, says an excerpt from the note.

The council also recalls that for years it has been denouncing signs of mining and other illegal activities in the area around the indigenous land, such as the attempts to install mines in 2019 in the Riozinho, in areas of the Amapá State Forest (Flota/AP). “In 2021, we denounced the circulation of miners in this river, including, inside the Wajãpi Indigenous Land (TIW), and signs of installation of new mining in the Sustainable Development Reserve (RDS) of the Iratapuru River, near the limits of TIW”, recalls another excerpt of the note.

“We have been asking for many years for the responsible bodies of the Federal Government and the Amapá State Government to investigate these environmental crimes and prevent this from affecting our land, our health and our ways of life, which depend on the standing forest”, the council reinforces in the document.

Urgent inspection

In the note, the council asks the inspection agencies, such as the Federal Public Ministry (MPF), the National Indian Foundation (Funai), the Amapá State Department of Environment (Sema), the National Institute for Colonization and Agrarian Reform (Incra) and the Chico Mendes Institute for Biodiversity Conservation (ICMbio) to investigate the case.

The indigenous entity wants to know why the river waters have become so muddy and if there is a relation with any natural accident or mining activity. “We don’t want our waters polluted or our land threatened by illegal activities around or inside the Wajãpi Indigenous Land. We, from Apina, are against mining and garimpo in Indigenous Lands and Conservation Units”, concludes the council, in a statement.

Check out the full document:

Search for precious ores

The Wajãpi Indigenous Land is located in the municipalities of Laranjal do Jari and Pedra Branca do Amapari, in Amapá, and covers an area of 607,000 hectares, the largest in the state, according to the Brazilian Institute of Geography and Statistics (IBGE). The indigenous people moved to the region more than two centuries ago from the lower Xingu River in northern Pará. Since before their approval and demarcation, in 1996, the Wajãpi had been living in retaliation against prospectors and hunters looking for precious minerals.

According to the book “Wajãpi Indigenous Land: from demarcation to experiences of territorial management”, written by Dominique Tilkin Gallois and published in 2011 by the Indigenous Research and Training Institute (Iepé), the Wajãpi had already encountered skin hunters, known as “gateiros”, and also miners circulating in the basins of the Jari and Amapari rivers in the late 1960s.

It was only in 1973, however, that the Wajãpi had their first contact with Funai, when the Federal Government was beginning work on the construction of the Northern Perimetral highway, the BR-210. One of the objectives of this project was to cut through Wajãpi territory and other indigenous regions. As the years passed, the region continued to be targeted by miners and invaders determined to steal the land.

In 2019, indigenous people from the Wajãpi village in Pedra Branca do Amapari even reported an invasion of 50 miners in the region after the death of chief Emyra Wajãpi, of the Mariry village. According to local leaders, Emyra had been attacked while returning from his daughter’s house. His body was found in a river.

In August of that year, a preliminary report by the Federal Police (PF), however, pointed out the cause of death of the indigenous leader as drowning. In December 2019, the inquiry investigating the case was filed by the Federal Public Ministry (MPF) after investigations ruled out murder.