According to the national director of the Landless Movement (MST), João Paulo Rodrigues, the group is not satisfied with the agrarian reform proposal presented by the Lula government.
According to Rodrigues, the MST has 60,000 families camped out waiting for land and the government has proposed settling 20,490 families in 2025.
“The MST remains very concerned about the slowness of the agrarian issue. We have a commitment to our base and we will not rest until we settle the camped families. There are 60 thousand families and the government is proposing a very weak target for next year, of less than 30 thousand families”, said Rodrigues live on Instagram, this Monday (11).
“The MST will not accept this. We are already asking for a very urgent meeting with President Lula in the next few days and we are of the opinion that the camped families have to settle. There is no agrarian reform without land”, he added.
Furthermore, according to the movement’s leader, the objective is for representatives of the MST to be received by Lula shortly after the G20 to determine a timetable for fulfilling all the items demanded by the movement.
Claims
In addition to the settlement of 60 thousand families, the MST charges:
- special credit through the National Program for Strengthening Family Agriculture (Pronaf);
- debt renegotiation;
- increase in resources from the National Supply Company (Conab);
- guarantee of R$160 million for “education in the countryside” and;
- construction of 50 thousand new homes for families and the renovation of another 150 thousand.
“These are the agrarian reform guidelines (in a very simple way) so that all of our activists can follow and know what we are talking about. Furthermore, the government is committed to helping us advance the agricultural mechanization agenda and the construction of a bio-input production program”, stated Rodrigues.
Finally, the MST leader warned that the government should not let the year end without meeting the movement’s demands.
Discontent
Last week, the Minister of Agrarian Development, Paulo Teixeira, supported the MST’s complaints about the Lula government’s slowness in meeting the group’s demands.
In mid-August, the movement met with the president at Granja do Torto, in Brasília, and made a series of demands – still unfulfilled, according to the group.
In July last year, the economist and leader of the MST, João Pedro Stédile, called Lula “slow” and “fearful”. Stédile also said that the government stopped responding to the movement’s requests.
