The Tabajara indigenous people of the Cajueiro village, located in the municipality of Poranga, in the Ceará, promised struggle and “blood” so as not to be taken to the country. Piauí. “They agreed to kill us. We agreed not to die,” reads one of the phrases on a poster held up at the hearing on May 24.
The controversy revolves around an old dispute, from 2011, between the northeastern states. At the time, Piauí filed a lawsuit with the Federal Supreme Court (STF) challenging Ceará’s ownership of an area of 2,874 km. It is precisely in this area that the Tabajara Indians are located.
The case is nearing closure. At the end of this month, the Army is expected to deliver a report on the expertise requested by the rapporteur of the case in the Supreme Court, Minister Carmen Lúcia. The dispute involves an area with 25,000 residents and 13 municipalities.
Leaders fear change
In an interview with UOL, Chief Jorge Tabajara, who is also executive secretary of the Indigenous Peoples of Ceará, said that the change could end the entire structure set up by the people in recent years.
“We have public policies in there: schools, indigenous public teachers, public servants, importing actions of the state government; And all of a sudden we’re going to have to go back to the past? If that is the case, we will even mark that territory with our own blood, but we will not give up in any way to stop belonging to the state of Ceará,” he said.
The Tabajara people managed to retake the territory in the first decade of the century, with the expulsion of farmers and squatters. According to the chief, since then, the indigenous people have been preserving the environment. They are currently in the process of demarcating their territory.
“It is from Ceará that we are, it is what we belong to and for which we work to continue to belong,” said Chief Jorge Tabajara in a manifesto last Tuesday. Want to
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