The “root peoples” facing the world and the coronavirus

Text by: Arnaud Jouve Follow

The 6,000 indigenous peoples, who are trying to survive and preserve their cultures around the world, are among the most vulnerable populations on the planet. Faced with health threats and multiple other pressures, these peoples, whose rights have been internationally recognized, are still marginalized. Explanations from Patrick Bernard on those who are also called "the root peoples".

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Patrick Bernard is an ethnographer, author, director and lecturer committed for over forty years alongside minority ethnic groups and "root peoples" around the world. With Visier Sanyü, a naga historian, he founded Icra International , an international movement of solidarity with indigenous peoples, then he created the World Fund for the Safeguarding of Indigenous Cultures, and the Anako Foundation .

RFI : Patrick Bernard, who are the indigenous peoples ?

Patrick Bernard : Indigenous peoples or root peoples are first nations, minority ethnic groups and indigenous communities descended from the first inhabitants of the territories conquered in the last 5 centuries by the colonial enterprises led by the western nations of old Europe. Today, indigenous peoples represent around 200 million people, or 4% of the world's population, including 6,000 people scattered across the planet. They are like splashes of color rebellious to the standardization of the world whose existence is threatened and rights flouted. They are victims of the colonization of lands, the destruction of food forests, environmental pollution, the negation of cultures, spiritualities and socio-political identities. A multitude of forgotten peoples who today undergo the proselytism of religions which do not accept difference, the invasion of their territories by settlers, companies exploiting gold, wood, oil, uranium, hydroelectric energy, destroying the environment on which they depend.

Why are these people particularly vulnerable ?

The vulnerability of these peoples is due to the fact that, descending for the most part from itinerant hunter-gatherer societies, they never considered themselves owners of the land, but rather belonging to the land of their ancestors. They are societies of self-sufficiency, the motto of which could be: "draw without exhausting", on the contrary, societies of accumulation. The translation of the names of these ethnic groups almost always means "Real man" or "Real man". A true man respects three fundamental laws: to have been initiated, to protect the land from his ancestors and never to leave it to invade the land of the ancestors of other peoples or nations, never to seek to possess the land, the water and the air or attach to any material possession whatsoever.

Real man therefore never seeks to possess, he is initiated, he protects the land on which his ancestors lived but does not own it. The very fact of attaching himself to material goods would make him lose this status and reduce him to the status of a backward man. The elders of these first societies did not hesitate to qualify the white man as a "primary" or "primitive" man, because he did not respect any of these three rules of wisdom and life in harmony with nature. This important difference in the conception of humans in their environment makes indigenous peoples extremely vulnerable to the insatiable appetites of globalized societies of accumulation on the Western model, for which the possession or even the appropriation of souls like land affirms. status and dominance over the other.

What are your concerns regarding the current coronavirus pandemic?

If the pandemic seems to be under control in the first countries affected, the cases of Covid-19 are multiplying in the countries of the South, notably in Latin America and Africa. Isolated indigenous communities, particularly in the Amazon, lack immune resistance to external diseases and do not have the sanitary means to protect themselves from them. The situation of other Aboriginal communities, despite their relative isolation, is also worrying, in particular because of their community lifestyle, the lack of information, the absence or remoteness of care services. From the start of the pandemic, Icra International advised all indigenous communities to prohibit access to their territories and reserves and, for those who can, to join their forest camps. The best thing is to isolate yourself in the forest.

In the United States, the Navajo tribe, which has 175,000 members spread over the states of Arizona, New Mexico and Utah, has 4,200 cases diagnosed and already more than 150 dead. This mortality rate, which is among the highest in the country, is explained by the lack of resources of a population whose health is often already fragile. In French Guiana, an Arawak Amerindian from the community of Cécilia died at the start of the pandemic. A large number of cases have also been detected among the Wayampi of the village of Camopi and among the inhabitants of Saint Georges de l'Oyapock on the Brazilian border. According to Radio Canada, 40 people from First Nations communities, including 4 in Saskatchewan, 11 in Ontario and 25 in Quebec, were declared positive as of April 9, and 5 cases were also reported among the Inuit of Nunavik.

What are the main threats currently facing these populations ?

Indigenous peoples around the world are being threatened and their rights violated. Peoples like the Pygmies of Africa, the Aborigines of Australia, the Amerindians of Amazonia or the Negritos of Southeast Asia are threatened with physical and cultural disappearance.

Among the main threats are, in the foreground, the loss, following the invasion of ancestral lands, extractivism, intensive agriculture and breeding but also religious proselytism which became radicalized with the emergence of churches and evangelical movements, most often from the United States or, in some regions of the world, from Islamic fundamentalism. Among the most important are the threats that permanently affect their territories and their natural environments with which they have lived in harmony since time immemorial. These ecosystems are the guarantors of their identity, their beliefs and their lifestyles which are today marginalized (hunter-gatherers-gatherers, slash-and-burn cultivators, transhumant pastoralists). In addition, these peoples are particularly vulnerable to new diseases, because their isolation has not allowed them to develop sufficient resistance to diseases brought in from outside.

Under the pressure of the different colonizing fronts, most of the indigenous peoples have found refuge in the margins of our world, deep in the humid forests, in mountainous areas and deserts, hot or cold. But these lands are today more and more coveted by the extractive industries (mines, oils, ores, wood, etc.) and the agro-industry (soy, palm oil, intensive farming, etc.) which must provide to the westernized world always more raw materials in order to maintain growth and consumption. These industries destroy ecosystems rich in biodiversity, pollute rivers, disrupt the rhythms and transhumance routes, ransack the primary forests from which indigenous peoples derive their subsistence. Some indigenous communities are today reduced to surviving on a few preserved islets, like these Bagyéli groups subsisting on a few acres of land in the middle of the green ocean and uniform crops of oil palms which have replaced the nourishing forest. forest communities in southwest Cameroon. Others, driven from their destroyed or colonized territory, without hope of return, join the outskirts of big cities, orphans of their environment, their way of life, forever distant from the lands of their ancestors, joining the other refugees from the outskirts already overcrowded urban areas.

In Brazil, the news is very alarming in terms of health with the Covid-19 and the policy of President Bolsonaro is also very hostile towards indigenous peoples. How do you analyze the situation ?

In Brazil, an increasing number of deaths have been recorded among indigenous people and contaminations by Covid-19 are increasing in a worrying manner. The vast majority of confirmed cases of Covid-19 and death among indigenous people are in the state of Amazonas, which has already declared the collapse of its hospital system due to the increase in cases of coronavirus in its population . Confirmed infections are spread across three Amazon states. Among them, four members of the Kokama ethnic group contracted the virus through a doctor from the indigenous health service. In the state of Pará, in the north-central Amazon, several post-mortem tests confirmed that indigenous people had died in their villages from the aftermath of Covid-19 without being able to benefit from the help of local health centers. . The Brazilian federal prosecution also alerted public opinion on April 8 to the "risk of genocide", fueling allegations that Funai, the National Indian Foundation, the Brazilian government body that develops and implements policies relating to indigenous peoples, led by an evangelical missionary appointed in February 2020, would have done little to protect indigenous communities from the spread of the coronavirus.

In the absence of strong government action, some tribes have organized to stem the spread of the pandemic. According to our correspondents on site, the Yawalapiti of the Haut-Xingu indigenous national park in Mato Grosso do not seem to be affected by the epidemic. As a precaution, they prohibited access to their villages. Along the Xingu River, the Kayapós have reached an agreement with the miners to cease their activities and withdraw from their territory. Along the Tapajós River in the state of Pará, the Mudurukus have displayed signs prohibiting entry by unauthorized visitors. The vigilance patrols have redoubled their efforts to protect the indigenous territory of Raposa do Sol in Roraima. But other reports suggest that illegal miners, loggers and illegally grabbing land may use the health crisis as a cover to intensify incursions into indigenous territories. President Bolsanaro's declared intention is to integrate the groups into the national society and to exploit the riches of their lands. However, it seems that the judiciary comes to the rescue of Amazon communities: indeed, a few days ago, a federal judge prohibited evangelical missionaries from entering into contact with the indigenous peoples of Amazonia, particularly vulnerable to viruses imported.

►Read also: Coronavirus: protecting the peoples of the Amazon on the political agenda

These peoples have internationally recognized but often little respected rights. What do these rights say in substance and how do you explain the difficulties of their implementation ?

At the international level, indigenous rights are recognized by ILO Convention 169 and the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples.

Convention 169 was adopted in 1989 by the ILO, but has since been ratified by only 23 countries, mostly Latin American. This convention is the only binding international legal instrument relating to indigenous and tribal peoples, recognizing in particular their collective rights to land and their right to self-determination. France has not ratified it, because it does not want the recognition of the prevalence of collective rights over individual rights to certain communities. Furthermore, the concept of indigenous peoples is incompatible with the French Constitution.

The United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples was adopted by the United Nations in 2007 after decades of tough negotiations. It recognizes indigenous peoples' right to self-determination and the choice to freely determine their way of life. However, this declaration is not binding, which is its great weakness, even if it can be raised during legal processes involving indigenous communities grappling with certain States or transnationals.

Certain countries, notably in Latin America, have incorporated into their legislation legal elements favorable to indigenous peoples in terms of autonomy, management of the environment and natural resources and prior agreement during any development program affecting their territory ... But it is to be deplored that these laws are most often flouted by the States having put them in place especially during political alternations. The recent case of Brazil, with a new president questioning the rights granted to Amerindians by the 1988 Constitution, is a sad example.

The whole of Humanity would have much to learn from the last wise peoples. Their message to other men could be to advise a return to a little more modesty in the face of the world around us and to reconsider the essential respect for our differences which must be cultivated rather than systematically erased because, true wealth being not material, it is from our differences that our true wealth and values ​​are born. By way of conclusion, I would say that it is these men whom some describe as "primitive" who taught me the meaning of the word "civilized". If you have to look a bit like yourself to understand yourself, you have to be different to love yourself.

►Also listen: Amazonia: the natives confronted with Covid-19 and the invasion of illegal gold panners

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