{"id":38660,"date":"2017-09-15T09:59:41","date_gmt":"2017-09-15T12:59:41","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.rioonwatch.org\/?p=38660"},"modified":"2020-09-19T13:41:34","modified_gmt":"2020-09-19T16:41:34","slug":"under-immediate-threat-of-eviction-horto-residents-mobilize","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/rioonwatch.org\/?p=38660","title":{"rendered":"Under Threat of Imminent Eviction, Horto Residents Mobilize"},"content":{"rendered":"

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

As night fell on Wednesday, September 13, residents of the\u00a0Horto<\/a>\u00a0community in Rio’s South Zone\u00a0met at an urgent meeting to discuss new circumstances in their ongoing fight against eviction<\/a>. Community leaders from the Horto Resident\u2019s Association<\/a> (AMAHOR) informed the crowd of around 50 residents of recent developments in the neighboring Botanical Gardens<\/a>\u2019\u00a0efforts to remove families from their homes. Em\u00edlia Maria de Souza, an ex-president of AMAHOR, warned the group gathered that in the coming days \u201cthe entire community must stay alert.\u201d<\/p>\n

She elaborated on the two events that prompted the emergency meeting, which had been announced via WhatsApp and Facebook<\/a> the previous evening. She told the crowd that the day before, Tuesday, September 12, a resident had witnessed \u201cpeople from IBAMA<\/a> (The Brazilian Institute of the Environment and Renewable Resources) in the areas of Caxinguel\u00ea, Margarida, and Grot\u00e3o.\u201d De Souza continued: \u201cThey were photographing and taking notes. I said these people must be addressed to know what kind of mapping they are doing in the area.\u201d<\/p>\n

More concerning, she explained, was news that the President of the Botanical Gardens Research Institute, Sergio Besserman Vianna<\/a>, had taken action to involve the Military Police in evicting Horto Residents. De Souza said she had learned the day before from a trusted source that the President \u201chad already requested that the Military Police\u2019s Shock Battalion give support for carrying out the evictions.\u201d However, she said, \u201cthey can only do this operation in the community with the authorization of the area\u2019s specific battalion, which is the 23rd<\/sup>. So yesterday the attorneys of the Botanical Gardens brought an official request to the 23rd<\/sup> battalion of the Military Police. As of yet, we don\u2019t know what the decision of the commander will be about this solicitation.\u201d<\/p>\n

These words evoked images of last November\u2019s violent forced eviction of Marcelo de Souza<\/a> and his family by shock troops. Em\u00edlia de Souza warned that this time the Botanical Gardens have requested the simultaneous removal of five families in various parts of the community, which typifies the city’s well-known ‘divide and conquer’ eviction strategy<\/a>. The operation could be imminent if approved by the Military Police.<\/p>\n

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

Horto has been resisting eviction from multiple fronts since the 1960s<\/a>. The Botanical Gardens\u00a0employed Horto residents<\/a> over the community\u2019s more than\u00a0200-year history<\/a>, granting them the right to establish their homes on its boundaries. However, the institution now argues that they are \u201cinvaders<\/a>\u201d and must be removed to increase the size of the Botanical Gardens Research Institute\u2019s area and “protect” the surrounding forest<\/a>. Last year under Michel Temer\u2019s government, a Federal Court of Accounts (TCU) decision<\/a>\u00a0approving the eviction of Horto residents bolstered the Gardens\u2019 crusade. This went back on an earlier plan<\/a> that would guarantee the permanence of the community alongside the Gardens\u2019 expansion.<\/p>\n

The gentrification<\/a> of the surrounding neighborhoods of G\u00e1vea and Jardim Bot\u00e2nico and the desirability of Horto\u2019s lush surroundings have also fueled real estate speculation<\/a>. Emerson de Souza, the current present of AMAHOR, explained at the meeting that \u201cthere are areas of real estate speculation in Horto, and the entire community, without exception, is suffering and will continue to suffer because of this speculation\u2026 They are speculating over our lives and want to remove 521 families from Horto Florestal in criminal fashion.\u201d Media giant Grupo Globo has reported that Horto\u2019s property is valued at R$10.6 billion<\/a>\u00a0(currently US$3.4 billion). The location of Globo’s headquarters adjacent to the community and their ties to the Botanical Gardens<\/a> put further pressure on Horto. Globo<\/em> news articles have falsely framed the community’s residence there as “irregular occupation<\/a>.”<\/p>\n

Em\u00edlia de Souza affirmed at the meeting that \u201cthey are allied: the Botanical Gardens, the city government, and the people from Globo. Our fight, our lives have nothing to do with the environmental question<\/a>. Here, we<\/a> are fighting against real estate speculation.\u201d Other residents agreed that the profit motive behind the efforts to take Horto’s land was driving the Botanical Gardens, Globo, and government officials. Em\u00edlia gave updates on the community\u2019s political and legal resistance efforts. These include fighting individual eviction orders in court through a partnership with law students at the Pontifical Catholic University (PUC-Rio) and the State University of Rio de Janeiro (UERJ), lobbying members of the federal government to support Horto\u2019s cause, and meeting directly with the Human Rights Commission<\/a> at Rio State’s Legislative Assembly (ALERJ).<\/p>\n

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

Horto\u2019s residents do not know when the slated evictions of the five families recently revealed to be in danger will take place. They could happen at any time. At the meeting, Emerson and Em\u00edlia de Souza and other residents called for renewed mobilization in the form of physical barricades and protest, techniques the community has used before<\/a> to remain unified in face of removal. \u201cWe have to put our feet on the ground because the favela of Horto is on the Botanical Gardens’ eviction list,\u201d concluded Em\u00edlia de Souza. She argued that absolute and unified opposition was key for preventing future evictions. The crowd dispersed with plans to meet again and maintain the strength of resistance necessary to confront the ongoing threats to Horto.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Clique aqui para Portugu\u00eas As night fell on Wednesday, September 13, residents of the\u00a0Horto\u00a0community in Rio’s South Zone\u00a0met at an urgent meeting to discuss new circumstances in their ongoing fight against eviction. Community leaders from […]<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>","protected":false},"author":159,"featured_media":38662,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1293,1267,1288,1333,1329],"tags":[756,11,884,282,26,25,1627,597,894,618,1292,18,10,270,2283,379,156,471],"writer":[2516],"translator":[],"illustrator":[],"photographer":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-38660","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-evictionswatch","8":"category-gentrificationwatch","9":"category-highlight","10":"category-event-reports","11":"category-by-international-observers","12":"tag-community-organizing","13":"tag-forced-evictions","14":"tag-horto","15":"tag-housing","16":"tag-housing-rights","17":"tag-human-rights","18":"tag-human-rights-commission-alerj","19":"tag-in-the-courts","20":"tag-jardim-botanico","21":"tag-neighborhood-association","22":"tag-organizing","23":"tag-protest","24":"tag-real-estate-speculation","25":"tag-resistance","26":"tag-sergio-besserman-vianna","27":"tag-shock-police","28":"tag-south-zone","29":"tag-sustainability","30":"writer-lucas-smolcic-larson"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/rioonwatch.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/38660","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/rioonwatch.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/rioonwatch.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rioonwatch.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/159"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rioonwatch.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=38660"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/rioonwatch.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/38660\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rioonwatch.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/38662"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/rioonwatch.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=38660"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rioonwatch.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=38660"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rioonwatch.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=38660"},{"taxonomy":"writer","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rioonwatch.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fwriter&post=38660"},{"taxonomy":"translator","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rioonwatch.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftranslator&post=38660"},{"taxonomy":"illustrator","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rioonwatch.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fillustrator&post=38660"},{"taxonomy":"photographer","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rioonwatch.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fphotographer&post=38660"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}