Source: Al Jazeera
The Justice Boat
A film by Arne BirkenstockFor 13 years now, Judge Sueli Pini has been travelling from the provincial capital Macapá to the remote villages on the Amazon Delta.
Watch the rest of the series To this day, the Brazilian state does not know exactly how many people live on the Amazon because many of them have no passport or birth certificate. To the authorities, these people who live in remote hamlets and villages are invisible: they have no access to social services, health care or the justice system. It is as if they do not even exist.
“These people were simply ignored and forgotten by the Brazilian state for many years.”
With her ‘justice boat’ Pini brings a wide range of state services to the population of the North Amazon region. The steam boat houses a court with a public prosecutor, bailiffs and public defenders, a medical team, including a dentist, doctor and nurses, and a passport office with civil servants and ID card forms.
But Pini has had to fight to be able to deliver these services.
“The cultural divide is even bigger than the geographical divide we have to bridge. Most of my colleagues and superiors have never been here, so they cannot appreciate how important our tours are for the locals and for the Brazilian state.”
So far she has been able to prevail – and thus make her contribution to protecting the inhabitants of the rainforest.
