Terra de Direitos launches campaign in support of the Paiol Telha community in Brazil

Terra de Direitos has launched a campaign in support of the community of Telha Paiol in the lead-up to the imminent resolution of the Federal Regional Court regarding the constitutionality of Federal Decree 4887/03 that granted land titling to the Paiol quilombola people of Telha Fundao, located in Iguacu Reserve, central Parana region, Brazil. 

300 quilombola families in the community are living in precarious conditions after being expelled from the territory that had belonged to them since the nineteenth century. This community secured access to the land in 1860, when eleven enslaved workers were freed by the landowner at the time, and received the territory as their inheritance. The Constitution of Brazil guarantees the right of community to possess titles for the land they occupy, the right to work and the preservation of culture, customs and traditions.

 

An eventual declaration that the Decree is unconstitutional would, itself result in a violation of the Constitutional , because it would remove the law used to implement these constitutional rights relating to access to land for quilombola families.

 

Since the 1970s, the violence and land expropriations to which the quilombolas have been subjected have lead to a situation when, today, the community is living with insecure land tenure, occupying only a portion of their original territories. Currently much of the area is under possession of descendants of European settlers or agribusiness agricultural cooperative Entre Rios, which produces materials for export.

 

 

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