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Sumaúma: Jornalismo do Centro do Mundo
EDITION 10
Tuesday, 07 February, 2023
Will the Lula administration drill for oil at the mouth of the Amazon River?
Dear community,

Since January 20, when SUMAÚMA reported that at least 570 Yanomami children had died for lack of health care during Bolsonaro’s four-year term in office, the world has turned its attention to the genocide of this Indigenous people. This is precisely what needs to happen because no nation can live with genocide without destroying its present and its potential for a future. But there are other horrific situations to reveal and combat, many of these provoked or aggravated by the far-right laboratory that was the Bolsonaro administration. Other imminent or ongoing disasters will test the sincerity of President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva’s campaign promise to protect the Amazon and other biomes, address the climate crisis, and respect peoples-nature. This issue of SUMAÚMA brings two in-depth articles on these urgent issues.

One report is the product of a partnership with King’s College London. The researcher, professor, and attorney Octávio Ferraz, accompanied by the journalists Luís Patriani and Patrick Granja, went to Katõ Village, in Munduruku territory, where the invasion of miners has made access difficult, and reported on the horror of mercury poisoning among this Indigenous population. So far, no mass testing has been done, but if it were, it might uncover another case of Indigenous genocide in Brazil.

The other hard-hitting and extremely important story is by Claudia Antunes, one of Brazil’s most experienced, respected journalists. Hard as it is to believe, they’ve managed to lump the Amazon and petroleum together into one single project—precisely when fossil fuels are quite rightly being cast as the bad guys who have taken the planet to the point of climate collapse. Understanding and working to block this destructive project is also a responsibility of the SUMAÚMA Community. We must show we will accept no further predatory exploitation of the Amazon. Nor will we allow Lula’s third administration to renege on its public pledges to protect nature and its peoples—which is what Lula’s second administration did when it implemented major hydroelectric projects in the Amazon, fueling a process of destruction the likes of which Brazil had not seen since the business-military dictatorship (1964-1985). SUMAÚMA will be on high alert, as a journalism outlet with a real commitment to democracy should be.

Happy reading and happy struggle! We will continue together, fighting like the forest, with joy as the main tool of our reXistence.

Eliane Brum
SUMAÚMA creator and director

Translated by Diane Whitty
READ HERE
‘Everybody has mercury poisoning—children, old people, pregnant women.’
This is life in Katõ Village, in the Munduruku Indigenous Territory, one of the lands hardest hit by illegal mining. If such mercury contamination were detected in a wealthy neighborhood in an urban area of Brazil, how would the State and the press react?
OCTÁVIO FERRAZ, LUÍS PATRIANI, PATRICK GRANJA
‘When the tide turns…the slick will come’
The imminent drilling of a well by Brazilian oil giant Petrobras in the Foz do Amazonas region is a foreseeable catastrophe which will test President Lula’s commitment to the environment. Case documents from Brazil’s environmental protection agency, Ibama, seen by SUMAÚMA, reveal the licensing process for the project is close to the point of no return.
CLAUDIA ANTUNES
Indigenous women move to the centre of power
The inaugurations of Sonia Guajajara, Célia Xakriabá and Joenia Wapichana mark a new moment in the struggle to protect nature and defend the rights of traditional peoples. About the meaning of this new chapter, SUMAÚMA talked to indigenous people from various parts of the country who were present in Brasilia to attend the inauguration ceremonies and participate in a women’s march.
ALESSANDRA ROSCOE
‘To defend the Amazon, you have to defend those who live in it’
The host of the podcasts Radio SUMAÚMA and Pavulagem shares his experience of the World Economic Forum, addressing the audience in Davos, meeting Marina Silva, and mingling with attendees: 'One person talked to me about Bluetooth phones as if he were showing me a mirror 500 years ago’
MAICKSON SERRÃO

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