Tereza Cristina: Government needs to stop MST invasions – 04/24/2023 – Politics

Senator Tereza Cristina (PP-MS), Minister of Agriculture in the government of Jair Bolsonaro (PL), says that the government of President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva (PT) must be tougher if it wants to pacify the countryside and curb invasions of land by the MST (Movement of Landless Rural Workers).

The senator criticizes Lula’s decision to take João Pedro Stedile, leader and one of the founders of the MST, on the official trip to China, and says that the movement should not “throb” in Incra (National Institute of Colonization and Agrarian Reform).

“When the president takes João Pedro Stedile in his official delegation — he has the right to take it, I wouldn’t take it — everyone hoped that there would be a pacification of this matter. While they are there, before returning they [integrantes do MST] invade nine farms,” ​​he said.

“This movement needs to sit down with the government, say what it wants, and the government needs to say what it can give. fair (24) to journalists.

Last week, the MST started the National Day of Struggle for Land and Agrarian Reform with the invasion of at least nine farms, including an area that belongs to Embrapa (Brazilian Agricultural Research Corporation), as well as Incra headquarters.

As shown to Sheet, the appointment of Incra state superintendents has been outlined in recent days. In all, commands were changed in 19 states, in addition to the Federal District. The leaders of Minas Gerais, Amazonas, Alagoas, Tocantins, Rondônia, Roraima and Amapá remain unchanged.

One of the main targets of the movement is the state of Alagoas, where Incra is headed by César Lira, cousin of the president of the Chamber of Deputies, Arthur Lira (PP), since the Michel Temer (MDB) government.

The senator admitted that the Bolsonaro government accepted political appointments — emphasizing that she is not against it — but said that, under her management, the Ministry of Agriculture changed regional superintendents when there were problems.

Faced with the invasions, the Lula government was forced to raise its voice against the MST. The Minister of Agrarian Development and Family Agriculture, Paulo Teixeira (PT), has stated that the invasion of productive areas compromises agrarian reform.

The Minister of Agriculture, Carlos Fávaro (PSD), classified the invasion of Embrapa as “unacceptable”. “I have always defended that the vocational worker has the right to the land. But to the land that is rightfully his”, he said last Monday (17).