Davi Kopenawa: Time frame is to continue stealing land – 06/06/2023 – Environment

For Davi Kopenawa, a shaman and political leader of the Yanomami people, the approval of the time frame —a “big snake”— will open up indigenous lands to prospectors and invaders who are currently operating in hiding.

Leader of the mobilization that led to the demarcation of the Yanomami Indigenous Land in 1992, Kopenawa says he is hopeless in the face of the lack of protection for the land. “I’ve already waited, like, 20 years… Never succeeded. The damage is only growing.”

According to him, the federal government’s operations to expel miners need support from the Army, especially on the borders. “But the military is not helping, because they are in favor of prospectors working in hiding”, he assesses.

Kopenawa passed through São Paulo last weekend for the launch of the documentary “Listen: the Earth Was Rasgada”, at the 12th Eco-speaker Show, and also to sign his new book, “Espírito da Floresta” (Companhia das Letras).

The work repeats the partnership with ethnologist Bruce Albert, with whom he wrote “A Queda do Céu”, in 2010. With a great impact on ecological thinking, the book tells how shamans “hold the sky”, preventing environmental catastrophe.

In this interview to Sheet, given at a hotel in São Paulo, Davi says the books are warnings against threats to the earth, which he refuses to name “climate change”. “To me, change is revenge on the earth.”

As mr. Do you evaluate the vote on the timeframe in the Chamber of Deputies? And what do you expect from the judgment at the Federal Supreme Court? [O STF] have to vote against. They are disrespecting what is written in the Federal Constitution. It’s not time for the timeframe to come out like a big snake to finish us off.

The garimpeiros are dying for the National Congress to approve this time frame law, so they can continue to mine and put machines on indigenous land. I didn’t participate [da tramitação do PL 490]but I know: the time frame means continuing to steal the land.

What do we still not understand about land protection? The earth will not grow back. The machine tears the skin of the earth, it is injured, it cannot be born again on its own.

Do you think that the machine is going to tear the skin of the earth, eliminate the water, then it will recover, it will be good again? I never saw. Never.

Just like leishmaniasis enters our bodies and, if not taken care of, kills a person.

But if you take care before entering, keep cleaning, it heals. The land too. Apart from the prospector at the beginning, she succeeds [se recuperar]. But the machine entered the indigenous land one year, two, three, four, five years working. And it’s all screwed up.

After the federal government’s actions to expel prospectors from the Yanomami TI in recent months, what is the current situation in the territory? They managed to get it out, but not all of it. There are still miners hidden. If you get into Venezuela, they’re hiding there, on the upper Orinoco River.

Lula is positive for us, but he cannot work alone. They are trying to increase the Federal Police, Ibama and Funai group, but it needs strong support.

If the Army works together with President Lula on the borders, they would take everything away. But the military is not helping, because they are in favor of prospectors working in hiding.

What is your assessment of the emptying of functions of the newly created MPI (Ministry of Indigenous Peoples)? I think that the force of nature sent President Lula a dream when he was in jail. No one asked Lula [a criação do MPI]he who thought of us.

He thought like this: I’m going to obey nature’s dream and let the indigenous people take care of their health, their territory, because we city people are only managing to ruin everything.

And we accept. Let’s try. We weren’t prepared.

I didn’t want to be a minister, because I don’t have a complete education — if I had, I would like to take over as Minister of Health. But Dr. Joenia [Wapichana, presidente da Funai] she spent four years as a deputy, she knows all the ways of politics. So let’s learn how to make our ministers work: Health, Justice, Funai, together with Lula.

Climate disasters are increasing and climate scientists point to a small window of action to avoid a catastrophe. Do we still have time? No. I’m not waiting. Hope is today and tomorrow. I’m not seeing any improvement. I’ve already waited, like, 20 years… It was never achieved. The damage is only growing.

They poisoned our waters. Here where you drink from, the mountains, it’s still protected, a little bit, but where the river runs, it’s not.

Therefore, I will not say that I hope to improve the health of our land, the forest, the city. We are all polluted, contaminated. I don’t study with science, I study with my xapiri.

Who are the xapiri? Xapiri is a healer of the forest, the land, the water, our home. Beautiful weather curator. When it’s raining a lot, the xapiri works, says “today it doesn’t need to rain”, and [a chuva] go elsewhere. The xapiri is not important for the Yanomami alone, it is for everyone.

Xapiri does not like pollution. He speaks another language.

How do you study the land with the xapiri? I’m a paje. Great village chiefs taught me to look where the land needs to be protected and respected. I have study. But civil society and the government just want to think capitalistically. They only want to think about merchandise: wood, diamonds, cassiterite, gold.

But they don’t think about improving health on our Earth-planet. Not just for my people, for us all.

I am revolted, as my mother Earth is revolted, I was revolted together. I’m not going to talk about climate change. For me, change is the revenge of the earth.

Is the revenge of the earth the fall of the sky? Yes. They are not listening, they are not believing. [O livro] “The Fall of Heaven”,[o filme] “The Last Forest” and [o livro] “Spirit of the Forest” are messages, warnings, to stop threatening the land.

Do dreams warn of earth revenge? Yes. The dream warns of meanness. When danger is approaching the village, the shaman dreams. Only the shaman knows. A good dream is also very important, it tells you when food is coming, the fruits.

That’s why we get jealous when white people arrive in the forest and knock everything down. Because the tree is like us. We eat to protect our health. It is not the medicine that protects.

Ingá, bush cashew, bush cocoa, bush honey. This is our wealth, what we dream about. The beauty for you in the city, the good warning, it’s a good salary coming, a good raise.

The dream speaks to everyone. It’s not just Indians who dream. The Amazon rainforest is ours. It’s yours. If there are no indigenous people looking after them, living in the middle of the forest, the destructive people destroy everything.

You need to take your eyes off the earth to look at the universe. Take off your dark, black glasses to see what we’re saying.

That’s how I learned. You have to suffer in order to learn, in order to experience another world. This is how my parents, uncles, fathers-in-law, my great xapiris taught me. They already died. But I’m here in their place.

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David Kopenawa, 67

A shaman and political leader of the Yanomami people, he was born in the Yanomami village of Marakana, near the border of the state of Roraima with Venezuela. Still in his teens, he became an interpreter for Funai. From 1987 onwards, he led mobilizations in Brazil and around the world against the prospector invasion of Yanomami land, demarcated in 1992. He was recognized by the UN Global 500 awards in 1988 and the Order of Rio Branco, by the Brazilian government, in 1999. In 2020, he was elected to the Brazilian Academy of Sciences.

_{O The Planeta em Transe project is supported by the Open Society Foundations.}