Bolsonaro Criticizes Environmental Policy and Demarcation of Indigenous Lands

RIO DE JANEIRO, BRAZIL – President Jair Bolsonaro used the meeting with governors of the Legal Amazon to criticize the demarcation of indigenous lands and said that the event shows the world what the country has achieved through an environmental policy that, in his view, was not used rationally. “The Amazon has been politically exploited in the past. (…) It was political irresponsibility of the past, using Indians as cannon-fodder”, he said.

Bolsonaro also stated that France’s President Emmanuel Macron‘s advocacy of the region’s internationalization is a “reality in his mind” and called for unity to ensure Brazilian sovereignty.

The president encouraged the debate on mineral exploration on indigenous lands. The governors who had spoken up until the publication of this article have agreed with Bolsonaro that there must be ways to foster production on these lands. Representatives from Amazonas, Acre, Roraima, Rondônia, and Tocantins have already spoken.

The governor of Roraima, Antonio Denarium, said that the state had been punished over the past thirty years for indigenous and environmental policies. He further said that 95 percent of Roraima’s native vegetation is preserved, but asked the federal government for assistance in monitoring and fighting illegal practices.

“It is difficult to inspect the land unless you know who is its real owner. We must carry out land use planning in our state and we must learn to separate the good from the bad. Today IBAMA gets here and fines everyone without the right of defense,” said Denarium. The governor also urged the federal government to help train local brigades.

Bolsonaro questioned Denarium on the reasons that led to the demarcation of indigenous lands in his state. The governor replied that this is “the product of an indigenous policy. Roraima is not only the richest land in Brazil but in the world. And the indigenous lands and NGOs are precisely centered in these areas,” he said.

In the conversation with state governors, the president has asked how much of each state’s territory is “hindered” by protected lands and said that many of the indigenous reserves “have strategic aspirations that someone has planned.”

“The Indians do not lobby and manage to have fourteen percent of the national territory demarcated,” said Bolsonaro. He said that today there are 498 new requests for demarcation of indigenous lands in the Ministry of Justice. “We are showing the world where we are coming from with this environmental policy that has not been used rationally,” he said.