{"id":33919,"date":"2016-11-08T10:58:16","date_gmt":"2016-11-08T13:58:16","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.rioonwatch.org\/?p=33919"},"modified":"2016-11-08T10:58:16","modified_gmt":"2016-11-08T13:58:16","slug":"national-forum-on-citizenship-and-poverty-debates-right-to-the-city-and-participation","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/rioonwatch.org\/?p=33919","title":{"rendered":"National Forum on Citizenship and Poverty Debates Right to the City and Participation"},"content":{"rendered":"

Clique aqui para Portugu\u00eas<\/em><\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n

On\u00a0Sunday, October 23, the second National Forum of Citizenship and Poverty<\/a> took place, promoted by the NGO TETO<\/a> in various Brazilian cities where it operates. In Rio de Janeiro, the event occurred at the Governor Leonel de Moura Brizola Municipal Library in the center of Duque de Caxias<\/a>, a municipality in the greater metropolitan region<\/a> of Rio de Janeiro.<\/p>\n

In the second edition, the event sought to fuse debate, music and art to further a discussion about the right to the city<\/a> and the relationship with poverty<\/a> and inequality<\/a> in Brazil, involving the NGO\u2019s volunteers, favela residents where the NGO operates and guests from partner organizations.<\/p>\n

The first panel of the event, National Political Crisis and Setbacks of Rights in Favelas, was transformed into a roundtable conversation and discussed the current federal political scene and its effects on favelas. Flavia Mendon\u00e7a, local articulator and educator\u00a0in the project Aluno Presente, spoke about how the guidelines and operation of neoliberal institutions affect the favelas. At a time of political and economic crisis<\/a>, rights are more relativized: \u201cThe resident only sees the state in the form of the police. It is difficult to make it so that they don\u2019t see their rights<\/a> as charity or meritocracy, in terms of ‘I need more’ or ‘I deserve more.'”<\/p>\n

\"The<\/a><\/p>\n

Guilherme Pimental, from the Meu Rio<\/a> network, spoke about the gears that a national political crisis sets in motion, taking the crisis out of the political arena and going to the police. This is exemplified, according to him, by the removal of political debate and greater importance given instead to the arrest of Eduardo Cunha<\/a> and even Marcelo Crivella<\/a>, which ends up shielding\u00a0political decisions that are being made, such as austerity constitutional amendment\u00a0PEC 241<\/a>, and that aren\u2019t debated. On the local scale, the shift also ends up removing the debate about the city.<\/p>\n

He also pointed out that at the moment there is a demand for order that is fueled by great fears sown by judicial institutions, the police and the mainstream media<\/a>. The first is a fear of corruption<\/a>, which creates the problem of redeeming solutions such as\u00a0the documents on ten measures against corruption<\/a>\u00a0which, if approved, looks to reduce defense resources and increase those for prosecution.\u00a0This is a permanent solution to a temporary fear, which will culminate in the hardening of the penal system and\u00a0ultimately will contribute to the biggest detention of the main targets of the criminal policy: poor black youth<\/a>.\u00a0In the case of the fear of economic crisis, there’s the PEC 241 which justifies social cuts to reduce public spending for twenty years, which will again most affect poor black favela youth.<\/p>\n

Thain\u00e3 de Medeiros<\/a>, resident of Complexo do Alem\u00e3o<\/a> and activist with Coletivo Papo Reto<\/a>\u00a0and\u00a0other networks, also stressed that fear and a crisis promote exceptionality. “It is based on the fear of the mass beach robberies\u00a0that you prohibit and search\u00a0the buses going from the North Zone to the South Zone<\/a>. It is based on the fear of drug trafficking<\/a>\u00a0that you justify the military\u2019s entrance into a favela<\/a> and the establishment of permanent occupation, or that you justify entering a resident’s home to exchange gunfire,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

He commented on the perception that a favela does not know how to organize itself and that this disorder benefits the trafficker: \u201cIn the 2013 protests<\/a> people learned to jump over the turnstiles; in the favela people have been jumping the turnstiles\u00a0for a long time. In the favelas there are resistances<\/a> organizing themselves and looking for transportation solutions, which aren’t just\u00a0jumping turnstiles. It\u2019s inventing the kombi<\/a>, inventing the moto-taxi<\/a>, inventing ways to survive in a city that does not want us to survive.\u201d<\/p>\n

Fabiana Silva, debate mediator, educator\u00a0and resident of the Parque das Miss\u00f5es favela\u2013one of the favelas in Duque de Caxias in which the NGO TETO operates\u2013stated: \u201cIn Parque das Miss\u00f5es there is no bus but there is a lotada<\/em>\u00a0which is a tour bus acting as a taxi. With this, the resident is able to resolve their financial problems and help others. We don\u2019t have a health center, but there\u2019s a resident who is getting a degree in nursing who goes to people\u2019s houses with first aid and to give vaccinations, bypassing the system.\u201d Dona Ilma, resident of the favela Parque das Miss\u00f5es and local leader, agreed: \u201cIf the people didn\u2019t organize themselves, the police would come, but public\u00a0policies don\u2019t enter.\u201d<\/p>\n

Thain\u00e3 said that was also one of the reasons why he doesn\u2019t participate in certain meetings\u00a0and broader\u00a0demonstrations: what people are claiming in them\u00a0has\u00a0already been a claim of the favela for a long time. \u201cI will not go to the streets to protest to take a bullet, because I already have to leave my house under gunfire and go back home under gunfire. If it means taking a bullet, I\u2019d rather stay here,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n

Another motive is that he doesn\u2019t want to be used as political capital to legitimize policies and institutions like the police, who would benefit by being able to say that they are talking with the favela. And that conversation is frequently fruitless<\/a>, according to Thain\u00e3: \u201cWhen I talk\u00a0with the police saying I want peace, I mean that I don\u2019t want the UPP<\/a> or the tanks, but they take it to mean that I want more police. What I want is to build together, I want to be the agent\u00a0of my own actions.\u201d Dona Ilma expressed similar concerns: \u201cBetween the police and the criminal, sometimes we prefer the criminal\u00a0because we can talk\u00a0with him, but the police don\u2019t give an opportunity<\/a>.\u201d<\/p>\n

Fabiana and Thain\u00e3 commented on the lack of penetration\u00a0of left-wing politics in the favela. \u201cNot even the left sees the favela as an organized place, with the potential to do grassroots organizing\u00a0there,\u201d says Thain\u00e3. Fabiana added: \u201cThose on the edge don’t\u00a0know of the left or the right, but they know the price of rice, they know the police enter that space and take away their rights, they know when they don\u2019t have access to quality health care<\/a>.\u201d<\/p>\n

Thain\u00e3 wrapped up trying to respond to the issue of what leads someone to go into trafficking: \u201cThe discourse\u00a0about there being no alternative is not the best… It doesn\u2019t have a right answer. But in general, he goes into it because he\u2019s an idiot\u2013and there he could also enter the police force\u2013or he goes into it\u00a0to make money. And money acts as a confirmation of subjectivity and self-esteem, to be able to look someone in the eye and not lower one\u2019s head, to be respected, to be seen as the being that he is: a powerful guy, a guy who makes things, who contributes to society.\u201d Wagner Bay\u00e3o, an art teacher\u00a0in the public education system, spoke about the key role of school to insert an individual into society, an individual who has his subjectivity constantly denied.<\/p>\n

\"cultural<\/a><\/p>\n

At lunchtime, there was a cultural intervention by\u00a0the experimental theater group made up of CIEP 350 students, a state school located in Parque das Miss\u00f5es, coordinated by professor Wagner. The piece presented, O Farso do Boi ou O Desejo e Catirina<\/em><\/a> (The Farce of the Ox or Desire and Catirina), written by Adriano Barroso from Paran\u00e1, brought typical elements of Brazilian culture like the Enchanted, a cult figure in the religious practice of Encantaria of indigenous and\u00a0Afro-Brazilian origin<\/a>, and enthralled and\u00a0moved\u00a0those present.<\/p>\n

The second discussion\u00a0on municipal elections<\/a> and social participation<\/a>\u00a0brought together different perspectives on how the vote for city government and city council members<\/a> can impact or not the favelas in the metropolitan region, how residents organize themselves to claim rights and the impact of the New Urban Agenda<\/a>, defined last month at the United Nations Habitat III conference<\/a>, on the dynamics of housing<\/a> and Rio de Janeiro\u2019s government.<\/p>\n

Fernanda Pernasetti, architect and PhD candidate at the Rio de Janeiro Federal University’s Urban Planning Institute (IPPUR\/UFRJ), spoke about the commitments made in Quito in the New Urban Agenda<\/a>\u00a0and the need to develop more participatory cities. Leandro Vieira, political scientist and sociology teacher\u00a0in the public school network, stressed that it is important to speak of the electorate to speak of the election: \u201cPeople don\u2019t like to talk about politics, and that\u2019s not their fault. It is important to have a substantial democracy<\/a> instead of having a formal democracy, a democracy that will go beyond democratic institutions.\u201d<\/p>\n

Egeu Laus, coordinator of the project Viajantes do Territ\u00f3rio<\/a> (Territory Travelers) which aims to\u00a0collaboratively map socio-economic activities\u00a0in the Port Region<\/a>, stressed the importance of civil society\u2019s role in the presence of a governance vacuum. Irene Melo from the Observat\u00f3rio das Metr\u00f3poles<\/a> (Metropolises Observatory) used the Minha Casa Minha Vida<\/a> program\u00a0as an example of civil society participation through Minha Casa Minha Vida-Entities<\/a>, a branch\u00a0of the program that allows associations and other non-profit entities build housing projects that are more aligned to their needs.<\/p>\n

Aline, an activist and resident in the Vila Beira Mar favela, also in Duque de Caxias, underscored the growing diversity and\u00a0mobilization<\/a> of civil society in the form of favela residents: \u201cI think that people are waking up, are better understanding what they want. I seek\u00a0better things for where I live, I seek\u00a0rights that people have and don\u2019t know about.\u201d One of those rights is the right to housing<\/a>. The land where her family and neighbors live belongs to the Navy. She said they have to live with daily uncertainty. \u201cThey would come and say: \u2018As long as we don\u2019t need the place you can continue to live here, but when we need it, you\u2019ll have to leave.’ But now people looked into it and they know that they have a right to the land<\/a>, because my mother has been living there for over 40 years. It’s adverse possession<\/a>.\u201d<\/p>\n

Marcele Decothe from Amnesty International Brasil<\/a> and resident of Parada de Lucas<\/a>\u00a0says she began to be interested in public policy due to the lack of it<\/a>. \u201cThey always told me that security policy<\/a> meant police, meant the operations. I went to read because I wanted to know why there were two Rio de Janeiros<\/a>. Why there wasn’t a public policy on health that worked<\/a>. The theory exists. It doesn\u2019t work because they don\u2019t take blacks into the equation, they don\u2019t contemplate\u00a0people like us. We live in a crisis of representation that will only be resolved once there are black city council members, a black mayor, a black president,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

For Marcele, race<\/a> and poverty are inextricably linked and core issues to think about in public policy<\/a> and social participation. She says it is necessary to transform a language that is academic and white and in that way racialize the debate. \u201cIt\u2019s not only empowering blacks in the sense of giving them power, but to emancipate them, in the sense of giving them a choice,\u201d she advocated. She sees black territories as territories excluded from the city\u2019s projects, but affirms that the Baixada Fluminense<\/a> and the favelas cannot be deposits of labor for the current mode of production that requires a black body to work.<\/p>\n

In conclusion, Marcele provoked the audience: \u201cHow will you get a person out of the house on a Sunday to be here to talk about housing and citizenship<\/a>, when he or she works from Saturday to Saturday, when he or she has never participated in decision-making<\/a>?\u201d For Aline, there is another great obstacle to participation: \u201cResidents lose confidence. They see a project come here and then they see it disappear. They need to see something gain strength.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"Performance<\/a><\/p>\n

The event closed at the Pra\u00e7a do Pacificador, where the library is located, with a performance\u00a0by the group Locomotivas, to which several people passing by joined.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

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