Less than a month ago, we were celebrating two major victories for indigenous rights and the environment in Brazil: the official recognition of Munduruku ancestral territory and the cancellation of the licensing of the notorious São Luiz do Tapajós mega-dam.
At the same time, uncertainty reigned as President Dilma Rousseff appeared headed for impeachment and the right-wing politicians who were conspiring to oust her were anxious to undo these recent victories and generally reverse the hard-fought gains of the 1988 Constitution, which ushered out a brutal military dictatorship. Although we and our allies have been critical of President Rousseff for many valid reasons, those who have replaced her are moving to dismantle the country’s human rights and environmental safeguards altogether, with grave implications for the Amazon and its peoples.
Now that Dilma has been removed from office, the newly-installed ultraconservative administration is pushing a constitutional amendment to abolish all required environmental licensing for infrastructure projects, which would mean that monstrosities like the Tapajós mega-dam could be authorized for construction automatically, without any possibility for legal challenge. Other proposals on their to-do list include freezing the demarcation of indigenous territories and opening up existing territories and protected areas to resource extraction.
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