Women mass mobilizations during the People’s Summit in Rio de Janeiro

The People’s Summit for Social and Environmental Justice and Defence of the Commons, organised in parallel to the Rio +20, officially opened the cycle of street demonstrations on Monday (18/06) with a grand march of women from various organizations and social movements. More than 10,000 walked through the streets of the center of Rio de Janeiro to give a clear message in questioning the false solutions proposed by states and multinational corporations, for social and environmental issues.

“It is no wonder that women are the major act of the People’s Summit,” says Alana Moraes from the World March of Women. And continues “We women are most affected by the model of the ‘elite society’ supported by and based on the exploitation of labour. Capitalism can not reproduce itself in a sustainable way, because it always need our domestic workforce and is based on the exploitation of labor”.

For the protesters, the only possible transformation of society is based on social and environmental justice. Said Noeli Taborda, from the Movement of Rural Women (MMC / Via Campesina): “More than 10,000 marchers are denouncing the false solutions proposed by Heads of State, who do not give up their economical system, on the contrary, they intend to plunder our territories and natural resources.” She explains that this model has always been the generator of violence to women, youth and communities, and now intends to respresent itself as the “green economy”. The organisators spoke to the crowd of thousands of militants of the World March of Women, indigenous women, peasant movements linked to Via Campesina from Brazil and worldwide, national student organizations, women organized in the Central Workers Union amongst others.

Marta Emilia, Guatemala, representative of Via Campesina International, ranked the march as a milestone in peoples’ struggle for rights. “Here, we articulate our struggles as women from different continents. In several parts of the world we are struggling for territorial defense and Mother Earth”. The peasant leader classified the day as “full of a energy for the Mayan people”.

Gina Vargas, of the Feminist Articulation MarcoSur, testified about the confrontation of threatening large projects in Peru. “We, a feminist alliance of indigenous and urban women, operate in the struggle against mining Conga, which accumulates as a class alliance to end sexism, male chauvenism, patriarchy and, ultimately, capitalism”.

At the end of the march, a group of forty women joined the occupation of the National Development Bank (BNDES) by indeginous peoples. For the manifesters the public bank plays an important role in the financing of which ends up as exploitation of women. “The bank supports the logic of the financial capitalistic system, and finances major events and projects that reserve jobs for men and put women in prostitution.”