We share here an unofficial translation of an article from A Nova Democracia.
During the last weekend of May, the 28th and 29th, about 300 peasant families, tired of waiting for the old state, occupied two large estates in the state of Bahia (BA). The increased occupations and recaptures are a direct result of the severe crisis of bureaucratic capitalism in the country, which is leading the peasant masses to fight for their survival and against the misery imposed on them by the federal governments, the genocidal military government of Bolsonaro and his generals.
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Hundreds of peasant families occupy large estates in Bahia.
THE VICTORIOUS RETURN
The first occupation took place on 28.05 and was a reoccupation of the Mata Verde farm. The 178 families were evicted from their old camp 4 days earlier following a court order and had to spend the meantime on the side of the road, 3 km away from their old camp. During the 4 days without land, the farmers were constantly threatened by armed men.
The families were not intimidated and took back the land. There they found burned out houses and destroyed crops, but they are rebuilding the camp in another act of resistance.
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Peasant families reoccupy large estates in Guaratinga after the eviction and find destruction.
OCCUPATION IN THE BAHIAN RECÔNCAVO
The second action took place on May 29, when about 80 families occupied the Cacaueira Agricultural Plan Committee (Ceplac) Experimental Station in the municipality of São Sebastião do Passe, in the Recôncavo region of Bahia.
According to the farmers, the place has been abandoned for 20 years. The Ceplac authority is linked to the Ministry of Agriculture, Livestock and Supply (Mapa). The Ceplac was created in the mid-1960s to renegotiate debts by owners of a large estate in their favor.
The peasants denounce with the occupation that the land lay fallow for so long and only now serves a social purpose.
IN THE FACE OF A SERIOUS CRISIS, PEASANTS OCCUPY LAND
According to research by A Nova Democracia, 30 land occupations were counted in the first half of 2022 alone. This is more land occupations than in all of 2021 combined.
In the state of Bahia, there were nine occupations and re-occupations. Among them, lands that were destined for the so-called "agrarian reform" but, on the authority of the state, only benefited the landowners. In Bahia, there are more than a thousand families who find in the struggle against large landholdings the only way to confront the most serious crisis of decomposition of bureaucratic capitalism in our country, asserting the just right to land for those who live and work on it.
The numerous attacks and evictions of camps, followed by reoccupations (as carried out by the families of the Claudia Sena camp in Guaratinga, as well as the events in the same month in Minas Gerais and Mato Grosso do Sul, and in the Tiago Campin dos Santos and Ademar Ferreira camponesas in Rondônia) , point out that, as Mao Zedong said, the law for the masses is to fight and fail, to fight again and fail again, to fight again until complete victory.
