The Justice Ministry awarded President Jair Bolsonaro Brazil’s “medal of indigenous merit” Wednesday, drawing criticism for granting the honor to a leader that indigenous groups accuse of “genocide” and “ecocide.”
Justice Minister Anderson Torres awarded the medal to Bolsonaro and 25 other honorees “in recognition of their significant altruistic service for the well-being, protection and defense of indigenous communities,” said a decree published in the official gazette.
Torres also granted the medal to himself, Agriculture Minister Tereza Cristina, Infrastructure Minister Tarcisio Gomes and Defense Minister Walter Braga Netto.
The announcement drew sharp criticism from indigenous leaders and allies, many of whom accuse Bolsonaro of trying to force native peoples from their lands, promoting environmental destruction and allowing rampant deforestation in the Amazon rainforest, home to many indigenous groups.
“Absurd,” tweeted Sonia Guajajara, national coordinator of the Association of Brazil’s Indigenous Peoples (APIB).
“As if all the reversals we’ve had weren’t enough, this barbaric dis-government has now added another: a medal of merit for Jair Bolsonaro and his allies for their ‘significant’ services to indigenous peoples.”
She said her organization would go to court to block the decree.
The Congressional Environmental Front, a legislative bloc often opposed to Bolsonaro, said its leader, lower-house Deputy Alessandro Molon, had filed a motion in Congress to annul the decree.
“It is outrageous that the same government that is trying to legalize mining on indigenous lands, putting these persecuted and mistreated peoples’ very existence at risk, has the nerve to grant itself medals of ‘merit’ for all the ill it has done,” Molon said in a statement.
Indigenous groups have staged massive protests against Bolsonaro since the far-right president took office in 2019 over his push to restrict the creation of new indigenous reservations, a surge in deforestation and fires in the Amazon, and his bid to legalize mining on their lands.
APIB brought a case against Bolsonaro before the International Criminal Court last year for his “anti-indigenous policies,” accusing him of “genocide” and “ecocide.”
Brazil is home to around a million indigenous people, about 0.5 percent of the population.
The medal of indigenous merit had traditionally been awarded to academics such as anthropologist Darcy Ribeiro or indigenous leaders such as iconic chief and environmentalist Raoni Matuktire.
