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allthebrazilianpolitics · 5 months

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Vale company benefited from violations against the Gavião Indigenous people during Brazil's dictatorship

27 years after the privatization of the company, Brasil de Fato reports the impacts of the Ferro Carajás railroad

On February 28, 1985, the Vale do Rio Doce train passed through the Mãe Maria Indigenous Reserve in southeastern Pará state for the first time. Of the 892 kilometers of the Carajás Railroad, 17 are within the territory of the three subgroups of the Gavião Indigenous people: Kyikatejê, Akrãtikatêjê and Parkatêjê.

Cutting through Indigenous and Quilombola lands, as well as twenty-two conservation units, the railroad was built in the early 1980s as part of the Grande Carajás project, launched during the government of João Figueiredo, the last president of the military dictatorship, which started in 1964 and ended in 1985.

The railroad line connects the world’s largest open-pit iron ore mine, in Carajás, Pará state, to Ponta da Madeira Port, in São Luís, Maranhão state. Under concession by Vale until 2057, the railroad still causes inconvenience for the 700 Indigenous individuals who live in Mãe Maria.

“The thin dust from the ore that passes through our land on the railroad has contaminated the lake, the fruits. When we take a fruit, it's polluted. There are many sick women. Ten women who had uterine surgery had everything removed. My cousin had everything removed. She was very sad. She intended to have kids, but now she can't. We believe it [the disease] comes from this [the ore] because we eat the fruit, the animals, and they're all contaminated,” says Adilene Aikrepeiti Ribeiro Airompokre, cacica – the name Indigenous leaders receive – from the Airompokrejõkri Indigenous community.

“This has had a huge impact on our health, food and land. We've lost a lot of trees, and part of our forests have been cut down. It all happened on our Mãe Maria Indigenous land,” she adds.

#brazil #brazilian politics #politics #environmental justice #indigenous rights #military dictatorship #mod nise da silveira #image description in alt

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kemetic-dreams · 4 years

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First Africans in Puerto Rico

Slave transport in Africa, depicted in a 19th-century engraving

When Ponce de León and the Spaniards arrived on the island of Borikén (Puerto Rico), they were greeted by the Cacique Agüeybaná, the supreme leader of the peaceful Taíno tribes on the island. Agüeybaná helped to maintain the peace between the Taíno and the Spaniards. According to historian Ricardo Alegria, in 1509 Juan Garrido was the first free African man to set foot on the island; he was a conquistador who was part of Juan Ponce de León's entourage. Garrido was born on the West African coast, the son of an African king. In 1508, he joined Juan Ponce de León to explore Puerto Rico and prospect for gold. In 1511, he fought under Ponce de León to repress the Carib and the Taíno, who had joined forces in Puerto Rico in a great revolt against the Spaniards.Garrido next joined Hernán Cortés in the Spanish conquest of Mexico. Another free black man who accompanied de León was Pedro Mejías. Mejías married a Taíno woman chief (a cacica), by the name of Yuisa. Yuisa was baptized as Catholic so that she could marry Mejías. She was given the Christian name of Luisa (the town Loíza, Puerto Rico was named for her.)

The peace between the Spanish and the Taíno was short-lived. The Spanish took advantage of the Taínos' good faith and enslaved them, forcing them to work in the gold mines and in the construction of forts. Many Taíno died, particularly due to epidemics of smallpox, to which they had no immunity. Other Taínos committed suicide or left the island after the failed Taíno revolt of 1511.

Friar Bartolomé de las Casas, who had accompanied Ponce de León, was outraged at the Spanish treatment of the Taíno. In 1512 he protested at the council of Burgos at the Spanish Court. He fought for the freedom of the natives and was able to secure their rights. The Spanish colonists, fearing the loss of their labor force, also protested before the courts. They complained that they needed manpower to work in the mines, build forts, and supply labor for the thriving sugar cane plantations. As an alternative, Las Casas suggested the importation and use of African slaves. In 1517, the Spanish Crown permitted its subjects to import twelve slaves each, thereby beginning the slave trade in their colonies.

According to historian Luis M. Diaz, the largest contingent of African slaves came from the areas of the present-day Gold Coast, Nigeria, and Dahomey, and the region known as the area of Guineas, together known as the Slave Coast. The vast majority were Yorubas and Igbos, ethnic groups from Nigeria, and Bantus from the Guineas. The number of slaves in Puerto Rico rose from 1,500 in 1530 to 15,000 by 1555. The slaves were stamped with a hot iron on the forehead, a branding which meant that they were brought to the country legally and prevented their kidnapping.

African slaves were sent to work in the gold mines to replace the Taíno, or to work in the fields in the island's ginger and sugar industries. They were allowed to live with their families in a bohio (hut) on the master's land, and were given a patch of land where they could plant and grow vegetables and fruits. Africans had little or no opportunity for advancement and faced discrimination from the Spaniards. Slaves were educated by their masters and soon learned to speak the master's language, educating their own children in the new language. They enriched the "Puerto Rican Spanish" language by adding words of their own. The Spaniards considered the Africans superior to the Taíno, since the latter were unwilling to assimilate. The slaves, in contrast, had little choice but to adapt to their lives. Many converted (at least nominally) to Christianity; they were baptized by the Catholic Church and were given the surnames of their masters. Many slaves were subject to harsh treatment; and women were subject to sexual abuse because of the power relationships. The majority of the Conquistadors and farmers who settled the island had arrived without women; many of them intermarried with the Africans or Taínos. Their mixed-race descendants formed the first generations of the early Puerto Rican population.

In 1527, the first major slave rebellion occurred in Puerto Rico, as dozen of slaves fought against the colonists in a brief revolt.The few slaves who escaped retreated to the mountains, where they resided as maroons with surviving Taínos. During the following centuries, by 1873 slaves had carried out more than twenty revolts. Some were of great political importance, such as the Ponce and Vega Baja conspiracies.

By 1570, the colonists found that the gold mines were depleted. After gold mining ended on the island, the Spanish Crown bypassed Puerto Rico by moving the western shipping routes to the north. The island became primarily a garrison for those ships that would pass on their way to or from richer colonies. The cultivation of crops such as tobacco, cotton, cocoa, and ginger became the cornerstone of the economy. With the scale of Puerto Rico's economy reduced, colonial families tended to farm these crops themselves, and the demand for slaves was reduced.

With rising demand for sugar on the international market, major planters increased their cultivation and processing of sugar cane, which was labor-intensive. Sugar plantations supplanted mining as Puerto Rico's main industry and kept demand high for African slavery. Spain promoted sugar cane development by granting loans and tax exemptions to the owners of the plantations. They were also given permits to participate in the African slave trade.[10]

To attract more workers, in 1664 Spain offered freedom and land to African-descended people from non-Spanish colonies, such as Jamaica and Saint-Domingue (later Haiti). Most of the free people of color who were able to immigrate were of mixed-race, with African and European ancestry (typically either British or French paternal ancestry, depending on the colony.) The immigrants provided a population base to support the Puerto Rican garrison and its forts. Freedmen who settled the western and southern parts of the island soon adopted the ways and customs of the Spaniards. Some joined the local militia, which fought against the British in the many British attempts to invade the island. The escaped slaves and the freedmen who emigrated from the West Indies used their former master's surnames, which were typically either English or French. In the 21st century, some ethnic African Puerto Ricans still carry non-Spanish surnames, proof of their descent from these immigrants.

After 1784, Spain suspended the use of hot branding the slave's forehead for identification. In addition, it provided ways by which slaves could obtain freedom: A slave could be freed by his master in a church or outside it, before a judge, by testament or letter. A slave could be freed against his master's will by denouncing a forced rape, by denouncing a counterfeiter, by discovering disloyalty against the king, and by denouncing murder against his master. Any slave who received part of his master's estate in his master's will was automatically freed (these bequests were sometimes made to the master's mixed-race slave children, as well as to other slaves for service.) If a slave was made a guardian to his master's children, he was freed. If slave parents in Hispanic America had ten children, the whole family was freed.

Royal Decree of Graces of 1789

The Royal Decree of Graces of 1789 which set the rules pertaining to the Slaves in Puerto Rico and the Caribbean

In 1789, the Spanish Crown issued the "Royal Decree of Graces of 1789", which set new rules related to the slave trade and added restrictions to the granting of freedman status. The decree granted its subjects the right to purchase slaves and to participate in the flourishing slave trade in the Caribbean. Later that year a new slave code, also known as El Código Negro (The Black Code), was introduced.

Under "El Código Negro," a slave could buy his freedom, in the event that his master was willing to sell, by paying the price sought. Slaves were allowed to earn money during their spare time by working as shoemakers, cleaning clothes, or selling the produce they grew on their own plots of land. Slaves were able to pay for their freedom by installments. They pay in installments for the freedom of their newborn child, not yet baptized, at a cost of half the going price for a baptized child. Many of these freedmen started settlements in the areas which became known as Cangrejos (Santurce), Carolina, Canóvanas, Loíza, and Luquillo. Some became slave owners themselves.

The native-born Puerto Ricans (criollos) who wanted to serve in the regular Spanish army petitioned the Spanish Crown for that right. In 1741, the Spanish government established the Regimiento Fijo de Puerto Rico. Many of the former slaves, now freedmen, joined either the Fijo or the local civil militia. Puerto Ricans of African ancestry played an instrumental role in the defeat of Sir Ralph Abercromby in the British invasion of Puerto Rico in 1797.

Despite these paths to freedom, from 1790 onwards, the number of slaves more than doubled in Puerto Rico as a result of the dramatic expansion of the sugar industry in the island. Every aspect of sugar cultivation, harvesting and processing was arduous and harsh. Many slaves died on the sugar plantations

#kemetic dreams #carolina hurricanes #african #africans #igbo #yoruba #puerto rico #criollos #slave owners #british #abercromby #afro puerto rican #afro ricans

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rusvltkenedi · 3 years

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Smithsonian 1901 map of Puerto Rico caciques

Caguax was a Taíno cacique who lived on the island of Borikén (Taíno name for Puerto Rico) before and during the Spanish colonization of the Americas. His yucayeque or Taino village's name was Turabo, it included the lands in the Caguas Valley and surrounding mountains.[1] This area included the modern municipalities of Caguas, Aguas Buenas, Gurabo, and portions of San Lorenzo, Juncos and Las Piedras in east-central Puerto Rico.[2] Guaybanex Caguax was an early convert to the Catholic faith adopting the Spanish name Francisco at the time of his baptism. His high rank in Taino society allowed him to retain his Taino name: Gaybanex along with his surname: Caguax. [3] Francisco Guaybanex Caguax sought to avoid conflict with the Spanish, as a powerful chief in the northern slopes and plains of the island he understood the heavy toll his people would suffer if they oppose the Spanish rule. Seeking peaceful ways to deal with the situation. As early as 1508 Caguax cooperated with the colonists request for labor and food supply. In 1511 he was one of only two chiefs accepting the peace offered by the Spanish just a few months after the Taino Revolt started. Caguax was taken captive to Hacienda del Toa in 1512. There he was humiliated before his nitainos as he was forced to be the governor's personal servant. Caguax died in captivity in 1518 or early 1519. He was succeeded by his daughter Maria Bagaaname.[4]

yuca

Late in 1508 Juan Ponce de León, commissioned by Nicolás de Ovando to colonize the island of San Juan Bautista, arrived in the territory of cacique Agüeybaná I in southwest Puerto Rico. There, both leaders performed the Guaytiao ceremony in which they exchanged names as a promise not to hurt each other. This sort of peace treaty allowed Ponce de León to settle the island and receive cooperation from Agüeybaná I's cacique allies to grow the yuca needed to feed the Spanish settlers.[5]

Caguax was among those allies willing to use his authority to organize his nitainos or "captains", as the Spanish called them, to direct the labor of naborias under them for such endeavor.[6] Products such as yuca and peppers were grown in Caguax's domain for colonists Francisco Robledo and Juan de Castellanos. In 1510 this production had a value of 255 gold pesos. Robledo and Castellanos not only had rights over the production but also over the Indians that would provide the labor in the fields or conucos in Taino language. [7] When gold was discovered in the Turabo River the same Taino power structure was again used to force them to work the mines and rivers in search of gold.[2]

By 1511 the growing tensions between the Spanish and the Taino exploded in revolts around the island that lasted into 1518. After Ponce de León won the first battles early in 1511 peace was offered to the island caciques. Only two accepted: Caguax and Otoao.[8] During this time of great distress Ponce de León was replaced, as the island governor, by Juan Cerón and Nicolás de Ovando was replaced in Santo Domingo by Diego Colón. Up until this time Caguax, his family, nitainos and naborias lived in their own yucayeque in the Caguas Valley near the Caguitas River. Archaeologist Carlos A. Pérez Merced, excavating in the area, found ceramic and pottery from three different indigenous periods: Igneri, pre-Taino and Taino. This indicates the existence of an ancient indigenous settlement at the site.

Early in 1512 Cerón redistributed Ponce de León's caciques among his friends and banished Caguax his relatives and entourage to Hacienda del Toa in the northern coastal plain, west of Caparra, the first Spanish settlement on the island. His mother, siblings, wives and children have been identified using early records sent to la Real Hacienda to account for the distribution of clothes and other goods, call the "cacona", given to the Indians in captivity once a year between 1513-1519.[9] [10] Historians Raquel Rosario Rivera and Jalil Sued Badillo among others state Cacica Yayo is Caguax mother, therefore she is the ranking cacica through which Turabo chiefs would be born. Her daughter Catalina, Caguax's sister, should have born the next cacique or cacica to reign after Caguax. but at the time of her death in captivity no heirs were alive as it was also the case of her sister Maria. Their brother: Juan Comerio could not inherit the line of succession. Cacica Catalina died soon after being taken to el Toa. Caguax death came later between the end of 1518 and the beginning of 1519. With no line of succession María Bagaaname, Caguax's eldest daughter,[11][12] was ceded the right to bear the successor. Comerio and Isabel Taya were Caguax's two other children. It is unclear which of his three children were from either of his two wives: María or Leonor. Around 1524 Maria Bagaaname married Diego Muriel an overseer in Hacienda del Toa's. This marriage was approved by the authorities and bore descendants.[13] As for the nitainos forced to move with Caguax to oversee the work in Hacienda del Toa records show Aguayayex, Guayex, Caguas, Juanico Comerio, Juan Acayaguana, Diego Barrionuevo, Esteban directing agricultural tasks and Pedro in charge of the mines. They directed 230 naborias from Caguax's yukayeque taken there to work the conucos and the mines.[14] Cerón forced Caguax to be his personal servant as his nitainos and naborias were forced to work the conucos and gold mines.[2]

The city and municipality of Caguas, Puerto Rico derives its name from him. A neighborhood there is named after him.[15]

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