Elected who identify with this ethnicity in state and municipal executives broke record in 2022, but slowly exposes low representation
The total of indigenous people elected for public positions in Brazil is still low, but it broke record in recent elections.
In state (governors) and municipal (mayors) executives, 24 indigenous people won mandates from 2014 to 2022. In the House, the number of elected deputies who self -declared in this way went from zero to 6 in the period.
The data cited above are self -declarations provided by candidates for (Superior Electoral Court). There is no skin color information for before 2014.
Despite the growth, the advance is still shy in the face of the Brazilian indigenous population, of (or 1,693,535 people), according to the (Brazilian Institute of Geography and Statistics).
The percentage of indigenous elected in state and municipal executives was 0.14% from 2014 to 2022. of the 16,786 vacancies, only 24 were occupied by candidates who declared this ethnicity.
In the same period, there were 1,539 chairs played in the House (513 in each of the 3 elections). Only 0.39% of this total was an indigenous.
The report analyzed only candidates with TSE -registered color self -declaration and disregarded elected vices and alternates.
Whites follow most
The study “Black Leaders in the Brazilian State (1995-2024)”, produced by the (Racial Gender and Racial Justice Training Center), defines the percentage of non-white (black, brown and indigenous) in high, medium and low leadership in the federal executive. This is a (PDF – 3 MB).
The research considers 3 categories of leaders:
- alta (positions equal or above direction and Undersecretary and Positions of a Special Nature);
- average (service holders or unit to general coordination);
- low (commissioned positions and functions of trust of lower hierarchy).
Of all leadership positions analyzed, 39% are occupied by non -white. This number has risen 17 percentage points in the last 25 years.
We position us high leadershippercentages are lower: 16% are occupied by non -white men and 11% by non -white women.
Slow advances
For the professor at (Federal University of Amazonas) Raimundo Nonato, specialist in indigenous movements, growth has “Influence on the conquest and expansion of a space of political representation”.
“The numbers are positive. This has influence on the conquest and expansion of political representation space, but since the number of indigenous people in many cities is tiny, they are low in relation to the general population,” says.
According to the teacher, the identity vote, that is, the vote of indigenous people in indigenous “It has political weight” and influences the result. For him, growth is “positive” and self -declaration demonstrates “A process of gradual rupture with the system that neglects them”.
Still, in Nonato’s assessment, the lack of articulation between the elected linked to the indigenous agenda “Creates barriers that make the increase in indigenous capital in the electoral market unfeasible”.
Milestones in politics
The 1st indigenous to occupy office and take office in the legislature was Mário Juruna, a federal deputy affiliated, at the time, to the PDT and elected by the State of Rio de Janeiro. Juruna was in the 1983 and 1987 Congress. He did not reelected himself.
In 2018, (Network) was the 1st Indigenous Woman elected to the House of Representatives. Nor did it achieve reelection. In 2022, 4 years later, Brazil elected its 1st indigenous governor, according to the TSE: (PT), in Bahia.
(PT) He was governor of Piauí for 4 terms (2002, 2006, 2014 and 2018) and elected senator in 2010 and 2022. In 2023, he assumed the position of Minister of Social Development in the Government of the President (PT). He says he has indigenous origin, but declares himself to the TSE as brown. Already “Indian” by Lula.
In the 3rd term, Lula created the Ministry of Indigenous Peoples. He appointed the Federal Deputy (PSOL) to command the folder. The congressman is considered one of the main indigenous leaders in the country.
This report was written by the trainee of Poder360 Gabriel Lopes under the supervision of senior editor Rafael Barbosa and Editora-Assistant Isadora Albernaz.
