A study by the National Coordination for the Articulation of Black Rural Quilombola Communities (CONAQ) reveals that the majority of quilombolas murdered in the last six years were victims of land conflicts. The research was coordinated by Selma Dealdina Mbaye and Élida Lauris, from the women’s and legal collectives of CONAQ.
According to the study, 46 murders were recorded between January 2019 and July 2024, an annual average of 8 murders. In 2021 and 2023, the number of murders exceeded the annual average with 10 and 9 deaths, respectively.
Of the total number of murders, 16 (35%) were due to land disputes. In addition, almost half of the targets played a leadership role in the quilombo. Of these cases, 36% were over 50 years old.
“In most of these cases, historical leaders of the quilombo were murdered, who died without seeing the title they had fought for their whole lives happen, like Mãe Bernadete”, says an excerpt from the research remembering the story of the quilombola leader killed in August 2023. She was shot 25 times inside her home, in the quilombo Pitanga dos Palmares, in Bahia.
The study also highlights Maranhão, Bahia and Pará as the states with the highest concentration of deaths historically. According to Conaq, there are two main types of “systematic violence” in these regions, with serial murders. In addition to land conflicts, domestic violence stands out, accounting for 24% of the victims.
Quilombola Census
The Brazilian Institute of Geography and Statistics (IBGE) released, for the first time in history, a demographic portrait of quilombolas in the national territory. The result of the 2022 Census, published this Thursday (27), indicates that the quilombola population residing in Brazil is 1,327,802 people, which corresponds to 0.65% of the population.
Incra, the agency responsible for granting titles to quilombola territories at the federal level, defines quilombola communities as “ethnic groups – predominantly made up of the rural or urban black population – that define themselves based on specific relationships with land, kinship, territory, ancestry, traditions and their own cultural practices”.
“They are, in general, communities originating from those who resisted the brutality of the slave regime and rebelled against those who believed they were their property,” states the Palmares Cultural Foundation.
This content was originally published in Quilombola leaders are the target of land conflicts, study finds on the CNN Brasil website.
Source: CNN Brasil
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