Jan Rocha

Landowners across Brazil are escalating attacks against Indigenous peoples. While Lula's government appears powerless, landowners are forcibly evicting Indigenous communities, especially where these have reoccupied lands stolen from them previously and to which they will be denied rights under the 'Marco Temporal' (time-limit) rule likely to be approved by the right-wing dominated Congress and already being applied by local judges.

The climate disaster in Brazil’s southernmost state has provoked commotion and solidarity but also questions and criticisms of the man-made causes which contributed to it.

The last few days have seen President Jair Bolsonaro begin to show his true colours as an authoritarian populist.  The ex-army captain sacked four generals seen as moderates, strengthening instead  the influence of Bolsonaro’s very own Rasputin, the extreme right-wing guru Olavo de Carvalho, and reinforcing his social media image of a strongman and crusader in a holy war...

The Brazilian state of Roraima is currently dependent for 70 percent of its power on Venezuela’s Guri hydroelectric dam. But socioeconomic chaos in Venezuela, and deteriorating political relations between the two nations, have caused Brazil to fast-track a 750-kilometer transmission line to replace the imported energy. General Otávio Rêgo de Barros, using a national security...

1 December 2017. Just over a year ago, Rio was on a roll, basking in post-Olympic glory, applauded all over the world for a successful Games. Now the arrest of its most prominent politicians has exposed the rotten underbelly of the ‘cidade maravilhosa’, the beautiful city. They are facing accusations of blatant, scandalous corruption schemes that have been ripping...

Jan Rocha takes a break from her usual razor-sharp analyses of Brazil's political landscape. Yet, even in Santarém, Pará, where the Tapajos river joins the Amazon, she finds that all is change: rapid urbanisation, a massive grain terminal, clearance of forest for soya and the arrival of indigenous people from Venezuela. A full moon hangs in the sky over...

Taking the 'country of the future' back to the past Sao Paulo, 20th October. It seems that Michel Temer will stop at nothing to buy his survival as president: even changing the rules to make it more difficult to rescue workers trapped into slavery and to punish employers caught using them. All this to please the powerful Bancada Ruralista, rural lobby,...

Sāo Paulo, 16 September: Like a tropical King Canute, president Michel Temer defies the waves of accusations battering his government, even when they are presented by the chief prosecutor himself. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SR2ZsDt9SPk credit: Metropoles.com In a 240-page indictment, Rodrigo Janot, the chief prosecutor, has accused the president, his closest ministers and allies, all members of the PMDB, of forming a ‘quadrilhão’ – big criminal...

Aug 14 2017 What is President Temer's weapon for fighting corruption charges? Why, corruption of course. In his relentless battle to stay in power, President Michel Temer has appealed to the very methods he stands  accused of by the Attorney General’s investigations: bribery and corruption, or as Theresa May might say, confidence and supply. This enabled him to win last week’s crucial...

São Paulo, May 25. A week is a long time in Brazilian politics, and President Michel Temer has revealed himself to be a stubborn survivor as he battles to stay afloat in the sea of sleaze accusations. He has just sacked  Justice Minister  Osmar Serraglio, himself accused of corruption, replacing him with Torquato Jardim,  a prosecutor well versed in...