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SPECIALREPORTS
| Wednesday 01
September 2010 |
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VENEZUELA
Hunger
Striker
Dies in
Land
Dispute
By
Humberto
Márquez
CARACAS
(IPS) -
Franklin
Brito,
who held
several
long
hunger
strikes
since
2004 to
defend
ownership
of his
farm,
became
the
first
Venezuelan
to fast
to the
death.
Brito, a
49-year-old
farmer
and
schoolteacher,
died
late
Monday
at the
military
hospital
in
Caracas,
to which
he had
been
admitted
on the
orders
of a
judge
against
his
will. At
the time
of his
death,
the
1.90-metre-tall
man
weighed
just 34
kilos.
He died
after
five
months
of
fasting.
He
staged
his
initial
fasts
when the
government's
National
Land
Institute
(INTI)
gave
neighbours
permission
to
occupy
part of
his
290-hectare
farm,
and he
and his
wife
Elena
Rodríguez
were
fired
from the
public
school
where
they
taught,
after
they
protested
to a
local
mayor
about a
crop
programme
implemented
in the
southeastern
state of
Bolívar,
where
their
farm is
located.
In 2005,
2007 and
2008,
the INTI
negotiated
compensation
agreements
with
Brito,
at one
point
offering
him
230,000
dollars
in
reparations.
It also
gave him
farm
vehicles
and
equipment.
In
addition,
the debt
of the
teachers'
salaries
owed to
Brito
and his
wife was
recognised,
and they
were
given
full use
of their
land.
The "cartas
agrarias"
allowing
neighbours
to use
part of
the land
--
property
that
Brito
had
originally
received
from the
INTI in
1999 --
were
eventually
annulled,
and the
people
occupying
the land
left
last
year.
Nevertheless,
Brito
complained
that the
government
did not
provide
him with
certified
copies
of the
documents
clearly
stating
that the
donations
were
reparations
for
damages
caused,
and he
refused
the
compensation
funds,
saying
he did
not want
to be
accused
of being
"an
accomplice
in a
corrupt
act."
He also
maintained
that the
revocation
of the "cartas
agrarias"
and the
offers
of
indemnification
were not
carried
out
through
the
proper
channels
and were
thus
illegal,
and
continued
his
protests.
In
December
2009,
the
authorities
removed
Brito
from his
protest
camp
outside
the
Organisation
of
American
States
(OAS)
offices
and
admitted
him to
the
military
hospital.
The
judge
issuing
the
order
said it
was
aimed at
providing
him with
medical
assistance.
But he
denounced
the move
as a
"kidnapping,"
refused
medical
care
from the
military
doctors
and
demanded
assistance
from the
Red
Cross,
and
rejected
an IV
drip on
Aug. 12,
only
accepting
water.
Agriculture
Minister
Juan
Carlos
Loyo
visited
Brito
last
week to
try to
reach a
new
agreement,
but the
hunger
striker
was too
weak to
discuss
the
case.
The
minister
said "Brito
has
always
had the
support
of the
government,
and his
land was
never
expropriated,
as the
private
media
have
claimed."
Loyo
said he
visited
the
hunger
striker
"in
response
to a
request
from his
family.
The
meeting
took
place
without
any
media
stridency,
with the
spirit
of
seeing,
once
more,
how we
could
help,
for
humanitarian
reasons."
"In his
last few
days, my
father
agreed
to
receive
an IV
drip and
some
medications,
with the
hope of
engaging
in talks
to reach
a
solution
with
people
from the
government,
but he
didn't
hold
out,"
his
daughter
Ángela
Brito
told IPS.
The
family
said in
a
written
statement
that
Brito
"died in
a
military
institution
where he
was
being
held
against
his
will.
The
government
of
President
Hugo
Chávez
ignored
Franklin's
request,
the
clamour
of his
family
and
calls
from
international
bodies
to allow
him
access
to
medical
assistance
of his
own
choice
and
confidence.
"Franklin
still
lives
on, in
the
fight of
the
Venezuelan
people
for the
right to
property,
access
to
justice,
and
government
respect
for
human
rights.
He is no
longer
flesh
and
blood,
but has
become a
symbol
for all
of those
whose
rights
have
been
trampled
on, and
who are
offended,
by the
arrogance
of those
in
power."
Marino
Alvarado,
head of
the
Provea
human
rights
group,
said "Brito's
death is
the
consequence
of an
arrogant
and
intolerant
manner
of
governing.
His
demands
could
have
been
resolved
through
talks,
and by
properly
returning
some
hectares
that
were
arbitrarily
seized
from
him."
Furthermore,
she told
IPS,
"Attorney
General
Luisa
Ortega
asked
that he
be
transferred
to the
military
hospital
with the
purpose
of
protecting
his
life,
but they
ended up
instead
guaranteeing
his
right to
die."
The INTI
said it
had
issued
Brito
the
"corresponding
land
registration
documents,"
and
stressed
that as
part of
its
agreements
with
him, he
had been
given a
tractor,
other
equipment
and
inputs,
and that
workers
had been
sent in
to fix
fences
and
roads
and
clear
land so
he could
farm it.
In
videos
taped in
late
2009 and
posted
on
YouTube,
and in
his last
interview,
in May,
Brito
said
that
when he
was
offered
the
compensation
funds,
the
authorities
did not
give him
certified
copies
of the
documents,
in order
to
"avoid
acknowledging
the
cruelty
of the
delay,
because
that
would
have
affected,
I
believe,
the
president's
image."
In his
last
hunger
strike,
he
demanded
that
President
Chávez
personally
take up
the
issue,
to reach
a final
solution.
In June,
the
Venezuelan
Foreign
Ministry
called
together
representatives
of
international
bodies
to
explain
its
point of
view in
the
case. On
that
occasion,
Alfredo
Missair
of the
United
Nations
Development
Programme
(UNDP)
said he
had
"never
seen a
state so
worried
about
the
rights
of one
single
man."
The Foro
por la
Vida, a
coalition
of human
rights
groups,
expressed
in a
statement
Tuesday
its
"emphatic
condemnation
of the
Venezuelan
authorities,
who
instead
of
guaranteeing
the life
and
integrity
of Brito,
constantly
encouraged
impunity,
making a
disproportionate
use of
power to
try to
force
him to
back
down
from his
just
requests.
"The
intransigence,
arrogance
in
governing
and lack
of
sensibility
led to a
result
that
sets a
grave
precedent
in terms
of the
conduct
of the
public
authorities
in
response
to
citizens'
demands,"
it said.
Brito's
death
coincided
with the
campaign
for the
Sept. 26
legislative
elections,
in which
the
opposition
hopes to
make a
comeback,
after
boycotting
the 2005
elections
alleging
a lack
of
transparency.
International
observers
reported
no
irregularities
at the
time.
The Mesa
de
Unidad
Democrática
opposition
coalition
issued a
statement
Tuesday
saying
Brito
was "a
victim
of the
government's
bullying
agrarian
policies."
In its
land
reform
programme,
the
Chávez
administration
has
redistributed
both
public
land and
privately-owned
land to
poor
farmers.
The
property
seized,
with
compensation,
from
large
landholders
was
deemed
to be
idle, or
its
ownership
could
not be
proven
through
legal
land
titles.
Other
countries
carrying
out
agrarian
reform
efforts
in the
region,
where
there is
a high
concentration
of land
ownership,
include
Brazil
and
Bolivia.
Brito
"chose
the
route of
the
hunger
strike
to try
to gain
respect
for his
rights,
but
instead
of being
listened
to, he
was
repressed
and
submitted
to the
jurisdiction
of a
criminal
court,
as if he
were
committing
a
crime,"
said
Delsa
Solórzano,
the
opposition
coalition's
human
rights
director.
She was
referring
to the
legal
decision
to
transfer
him to
the
military
hospital.
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