Brazil: Plan to build giant wall around ghetto to protect rainforest?

Plans to surround a Rio de Janeiro slum with a 650-metre-long concrete
barrier have come under fire from environmentalists and human rights
activists. Authorities say the R$1m (£300,000) “eco-barrier”, which
will encircle part of the famous Dona Marta slum in southern part of
the city, is intended to protect the nearby Atlantic rainforest from
illegal occupation as well as improve security and living conditions
for slum residents. As tenders for construction of the 3-metre-high
(10ft) wall opened yesterday, critics claimed the project was a form
of “social apartheid”, comparing it to ­Israel’s security barrier.
“This is something that is very similar to what Israel does to the
Palestinians and to what happened in South Africa,” said Mauricio
Campos, from the Rio human rights group Network of Communities Against
Violence.

He said a wall would serve only to “segregate” slum
residents from the rest of society. The wall is expected to be
completed by the end of this year and, according to reports in the
local press, may be followed by similar barriers around Rio’s other
slums, know as favelas. In a statement, the state governor, Sergio
Cabral, who ordered the “eco-limit” fence to be built, said it was
part of moves by his administration to improve living standards and
protect slum residents from the armed gangs that control many of Rio’s
600 or so slums. “What has happened in Rio de Janeiro over the last
two decades has been the passivity of authorities in relation to the
uncontrolled growth of the slums,” he said. Such walls would, Cabral
said, help the city deal with “drug trafficking and vigilantes, [by]
putting limits on uncontrolled growth”. Dona Marta is home to an
estimated 7,500 people. The favela was the setting for an
award-winning documentary about cocaine by the British film-maker
Angus Macqueen, as well as a 1996 Michael Jackson music video directed
by Spike Lee. Jackson’s producers were forced to negotiate access with
the local drug traffickers. Since last November, however, the
shantytown has been under 24-hour police occupation as part of a state
government initiative to make Dona Marta a “model favela”. In
December, Rio’s security secretary boasted that the slum was “free
from the law of the rifle”.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2009/jan/06/brazil-rio-slum-barrier

— Posted to http://forestpolicyresearch.com via gmail to posterous and
also to forestpolicyresearch@yahoogroups.com

Posted via email from Deane’s posterous