This record is a partial extract of the original cable. The full text of the original cable is not available.

UNCLAS SECTION 01 OF 04 BRASILIA 000873 
 
SIPDIS 
 
SENSITIVE 
 
E.O. 12958: N/A 
TAGS: PHUM PGOV EAGR SOCI BR
SUBJECT: BRAZIL'S LANDLESS MOVEMENT - BACK ON THE MOVE 
 
REF: A. 03 BRASILIA 2375 
 
     ¶B. 03 BRASILIA 2428 
     ¶C. 03 BRASILIA 3739 
     ¶D. 03 SAO PAULO 0924 
     ¶E. 03 BRASILIA 3066 
 
¶1. (SBU) SUMMARY.  After months of relative quiet, Brazil's 
Landless Movement (MST) has initiated a wave of land 
occupations timed to coincide with the anniversary of a 1996 
massacre.  Many occupations are in the northeastern state of 
Pernambuco, where other groups besides MST are active.  In 
Bahia, the invasion of a cellulose plantation pits the 
administration's populist impulses against its need to 
protect agribusiness investments.  MST's best known leader 
called for a "Red April" of actions, but later toned down his 
rhetoric, saying MST is not trying to undermine the 
government but is impatient with slow progress on the 
National Agrarian Reform Plan.  The government has now 
authorized R$1.7 billion (about US$570 million) to get the 
National Plan back on track, but it is not clear if or when 
the money will actually be made available.  MST's 
high-profile activities attract great attention but at 
present are neither as numerous nor as violent as in the late 
1990s.  With the Lula administration torn between its support 
for agrarian reform and its responsibilities to agribusiness, 
public security, and fiscal austerity, there may be some 
modest progress made, but MST will not reduce its pressure. 
END SUMMARY. 
 
APRIL OCCUPATIONS BECOMING AN ANNUAL RITE 
----------------------------------------- 
¶2. (SBU) On April 17, 1996, nineteen landless activists were 
killed by police in the town of Eldorado do Carajas in the 
northern Brazilian state of Para.  (N.b., only two of 145 
defendants were ever convicted, and they remain free on 
appeal.)  The massacre gained international attention and was 
a watershed for the Landless Rural Workers' Movement (MST), 
radicalizing it further and turning it against the Cardoso 
government.  MST, established in 1984, is Brazil's primary 
agitator for agrarian reform (refs A, B).  Its demands are 
built around the proven tactic of occupation of farmland by 
hundreds of landless families until the government cedes 
title.  In its early years, MST typically occupied lands that 
were unproductive or where title was in doubt, but after the 
1996 massacre, the movement became far more belligerent and 
just as likely to invade government buildings, productive 
farms, or land owned by multinationals in order to score 
political points. 
 
¶3. (SBU) In recent years, MST has organized growing waves of 
occupations and demonstrations in late-March/early-April to 
coincide with the anniversary of the 1996 massacre.  Since 
mid-March, MST and other groups have carried out a 
coordinated campaign of at least 53 land invasions (the 
number grows daily) in fourteen states involving 15,000 
landless families, plus road blockades and demonstrations. 
Much of the activity is in the northeastern state of 
Pernambuco, where many of the 25 reported occupations are led 
not by MST but by FETAPE ("Pernambuco State Agricultural 
Workers' Federation"), a rival organization that has tactical 
and ideological differences with MST. 
 
PERNAMBUCO - LATEST HOTBED OF OCCUPATIONS 
----------------------------------------- 
¶4. (SBU) FETAPE has organized a reported 19 occupations in 
Pernambuco in recent weeks --it claims to have mobilized 
1,900 families-- but is careful to set up its camps outside 
target plantations to avoid running afoul of MP 2183.  This 
Presidential Decree, issued by a frustrated President Cardoso 
in May 2000 and still in force, bars for two years the 
government from expropriating and redistributing lands that 
are illegally occupied.  The Decree sharply reduced land 
invasions, forcing activists to develop alternatives  --such 
as setting up camps along roadsides or at plantation gates, 
or occupying government offices.  FETAPE President Aristides 
dos Santos says his organization now has a total of 153 camps 
in Pernambuco comprising 9,400 families, but because of MP 
2183, it has not occupied any of the 95 unproductive farms 
that it is pressing the state to expropriate. 
 
¶5. (SBU) MST's leader in Pernambuco, Jaime Amorim, has no 
such compunctions.  MST has occupied six farms this month, 
essentially taking them off the table for redistribution for 
two years.  MST may be particularly radicalized in Pernambuco 
precisely because of intense competition from other activist 
groups.  Not only FETAPE, but also MAST, MLST, MPA, MTBST, 
MTB, MTL, MTR, MTRUB, OLC, UAPE, and COOPTERRA are active, to 
greater or lesser degrees.  OLC ("Organization for Struggle 
in the Fields"), for example, is more likely to occupy 
productive large-scale farms.  Amorim blames the government 
for Pernambuco troubles, saying "INCRA (the GoB's agrarian 
reform agency) did not expropriate either occupied or 
unoccupied areas".  INCRA's state director Joao Farias 
(himself a former MST activist) is more sympathetic to 
FETAPE's tactic of providing the state with lists of likely 
farms, rather than occupying them outright.  Farias told us 
that the immediate situation is not as explosive as depicted 
in the press, but if unaddressed, Pernambuco's agrarian 
crisis is a "potential powder keg". 
 
¶6. (SBU) The land problem in Pernambuco is rooted in its 
historical sugar economy that promoted the creation of 
enormous plantations worked by families of cane-cutters who 
subsisted on their own small plots.  Since the 1980s, sugar 
mills have been failing, leaving an estimated 50,000 families 
with neither land nor steady wage employment.  The result is 
a corps of hungry underemployed fieldworkers who have swelled 
the ranks of MST and the other landless organizations. 
Worse, the GoB's INCRA is chronically underfunded and has not 
resettled a single landless family in Pernambuco in 2004 
(though its officials say it is processing sites that it 
hopes to redistribute later this year).  INCRA's Farias told 
us that only 11,500 families have been resettled in 
Pernambuco in the past forty years --perhaps 20% of the 
landless. 
 
BAHIA - AGRIBUSINESS TRUMPS OCCUPATION 
-------------------------------------- 
¶7. (SBU) In what is reportedly the largest-ever land invasion 
in the state of Bahia, on 4 April, 2,500 families organized 
by MST seized a 53-acre plantation near Porto Seguro, 
destroying eucalyptus trees (a source of cellulose for paper 
products).  The farm is owned by Veracel (a joint venture 
with a Swedish-Finnish partner), and supplies the firm's new 
nearby pulp mill, soon to be the world's largest.  Last year, 
Lula met with Veracel officials to laud their decision to 
invest US$1.25 billion in the Bahia operation --the largest 
single foreign investment during his administration.  The GoB 
condemned the Veracel occupation, calling it bad for Brazil 
and bad for business, adding that the government would never 
expropriate the site.  On April 8, MST appeared ready to call 
off the invasion in return for an INCRA pledge to speed 
redistribution of 12,000 acres already expropriated.  MST 
periodically seizes productive farms, particularly those 
owned by multinationals (in 2003 it occupied several Monsanto 
sites to protest the cultivation of biotech crops - ref D). 
 
NATIONAL PLAN - LESS THAN HOPED 
------------------------------- 
¶8. (SBU) Lula's commitment to the landless dates to the early 
1980s when the PT party and MST grew up together.  During his 
1994 presidential campaign he said, "With a single pen 
stroke, I'll give you so much land you won't be able to 
occupy it".  As President, he has learned that the problem is 
not so easily solved.  In November 2003, Lula unveiled his 
National Agrarian Reform Plan (ref C), pledging to resettle 
400,000 landless families by the end of his term in December 
¶2006.  The plan's novelty was to link land distribution to 
measures making the farms viable, such as technical 
assistance, infrastructure, and credit.  The National Plan is 
good on paper but is far from being fulfilled.  According to 
statistics released by the GoB's agrarian reform agency 
INCRA, only 36,800 families were resettled in 2003 
(two-thirds of them in the Amazon region).  This left the 
administration far short of its goal of resettling 60,000 
families in its first year and means that it will have to 
resettle 121,000 families in each of the next three years to 
reach the goal of 400,000 families. 
 
MST LEADER'S RED HOT RHETORIC... 
-------------------------------- 
¶9. (SBU) Joao Pedro Stedile, MST's founder and best-known 
leader, often makes unhelpful comments (last year he called 
for 'war on landowners'), announcing recently, "April will be 
a red month.  We are going to make life hell.  April will 
catch fire."  Listening to sharp criticism during a later 
congressional hearing, Stedile backtracked, saying he meant 
"to 'pester' the government not make its life hell" and that 
"Red April refers to our flags".  MST, he said, "does not 
seek to destabilize the government but to spur debate".  He 
also apologized for a comment by fellow MST leader Jaime 
Amorim that "for every one of us they kill, we'll kill ten." 
Stedile noted that "it is stupid for us to use violence 
because we end up paying.  The ones who die are on our side." 
 In an April 5 interview he explained that after the November 
2003 announcement of the National Plan, MST did not halt its 
invasions because of any truce with the GoB, but rather 
focused on (non-invasion) activities, such as organizing its 
base and developing its training programs.  MST, he said, 
ended 2003 with 200,000 families camped at 700 sites.  True 
to form, he added, "The government should give signals that 
it is on the side of the poor against the rich".  He also 
listed Lula's best ministers as ForMin Celso Amorim ("has the 
courage to confront the gringos, wins 'Brazilian of the Year' 
award"); and Environment Minister Marina Silva ("defends our 
people from Monsanto and the handful of loggers who want to 
control the Amazon"). 
 
...AND THE GOVERNMENT'S RESPONSE 
-------------------------------- 
¶10. (SBU) On April 2, Lula appeared to respond to Stedile's 
"Red April" comments by announcing that R$1.7 billion (about 
US$570 million) would be allocated to the Ministry of 
Agrarian Development to support the National Plan.  Denying 
that he was acting only because MST was the squeaky wheel, he 
said, "Agrarian reform is an issue of social justice, we will 
not be forced into it by the shouters".  Lula recommitted his 
government to fulfill the Plan's targets, and Agrarian 
Development Minister Rossetto added that Lula had promised 
funding for 115,000 settlements in 2004. 
 
¶11. (SBU) INCRA's Chief of Staff, Viviane Coimbra, told us 
that the National Plan is sound and INCRA can meet the 
resettlement goal "if we get the funding".  But she is not 
optimistic that even the 2004 money would be forthcoming in 
this tight fiscal environment.  She does not believe the Plan 
will be fulfilled.  Stedile sounded a bit more charitable, 
saying, "The main thing about (Lula's) announcement was not 
the amount of money, but the government's declaration that 
resources will not be an obstacle to meeting the goal of 
400,000 families."  Opposition Senator Alvaro Dias (PSDB), 
who chaired the hearing at which Stedile appeared, feels that 
the R$1.7 billion is not sufficient and that in any case 
INCRA lacks structure and competence to carry out the Plan, 
noting, "There is a large pocket of poverty in the 
countryside and social pressure will be even greater if the 
Plan is not successful".  He pointed out that land 
occupations damage the agribusiness sector that accounted for 
42% of Brazil's exports last year. 
 
COMMENT - BLOODY LAND DISPUTES HAVE BEEN BLOODIER 
--------------------------------------------- ---- 
¶12. (SBU) The bout of national angst sparked by MST's 
March/April invasions has become an annual event, generating 
attention for the landless and criticism from the press.  But 
this year is running about the same as last year in terms of 
numbers of invasions and violence, and far below the peak 
1998-1999 period, when memories of the 1996 massacre were 
fresh and MST was in open conflict with the Cardoso 
government.  The following are GoB statistics (similar 
statistics compiled by the Catholic Church's Pastoral Land 
Commission show the same trends but run higher in absolute 
numbers): 
 
YEAR:                        1999  2002  2003  2004 
TOTAL ANNUAL OCCUPATIONS:    502      183   202 
OCCUPATIONS IN MARCH:        101      7   30     40 
DEATHS IN AGRARIAN CONFLICTS: 101    20    42     2 
 
¶13. (SBU) Lula's competing impulses --defending agrarian 
reform while also supporting agribusiness, public security, 
and fiscal austerity-- will be on display in the coming weeks 
as MST's "Red April" reaches its climax.  Expect continued 
hardline rhetoric from landless leaders, matched by lip 
service from administration officials on both sides of the 
issue.  Some budget resources are likely to be freed for 
agrarian reform, though not enough to meet the National 
Plan's targets.  On the other hand, MST will offer no truce 
in its land invasions --it never does-- whether or not the 
government meets its demands. 
 
¶14. (U) This report was coordinated with Amconsul Recife. 
HRINAK