One of the biggest problems in the impoverished country of Paraguay is the concentration of land in the hands of a few. (According to the BBC, less than "2% of landowners are said to control 70% of the arable land.”) It is therefore no surprise that land reform is a hot topic in the landlocked state and often the reason for frequent demonstrations.Last week, about 2000 protestors blocked the national highway and called for the distribution of land owned by the Rev. Sun Myung Moon’s Unification Church. The protest led to a brief yet massive bottleneck on the road connecting the capital city of Asuncion to the rest of Paraguay. The demonstrators- mostly peasants from the western part of the country- demanded to meet with President Fernando Lugo or else they would march into Asuncion.
The land in question- about 128,000 acres- had been expropriated in 2005 for residents of Puerto Casado yet a high court two years later ordered the return of that land to a firm owned by Moon. That company pledged to give a little over half that land to the peasants, yet the protestors claimed that the land is sparse and would divide their community.
The land claimed by the demonstrators is a drop in the bucket compared to the vast land holdings controlled by Moon:
The Unification Church owns more than 600,000 hectares (1.48 million acres) in northern Paraguay, near other holdings in Brazil.Image- ultimahora.com
The cult acquired the land in 2000 for an environmental and tourism project…
The Unification Church, founded in 1954 by Moon, has been accused of human rights violations and questionable financial dealings in several countries.
The church has extensive property holdings around the world, including businesses and land.
Online Sources- ultimahora.com, univision.com, LAHT, BBC News, IPS
I live in Paraguay (Peace Corps Volunteer) and these protests have been more and more frequent up in my area. I live in Concepcion, and the campesinos are out there almost weekly to protest, and they often shut down the roads.
ReplyDelete