Risk of landslide in indigenous neighborhood is ignored by Manaus City Hall

Victória Sales – Cenarium Magazine

MANAUS – Residents of the indigenous community Parque das Tribos, located in the Tarumã Açu neighborhood, west zone of Manaus, denounced landslides that are compromising the movement of people, besides threatening several houses that are at risk of collapsing. A stretch that connects the first stage with the second part of the community is giving way with the descent of rainwater.

According to the secretary of the association cacica Lutana do Parque das Tribos, Samia Gonzaga da Silva, the request process in Manaus City Hall happens since 2004 and has never been solved. “Here in the community, we residents have been asking for help from the competent bodies for over a month about these craters that have opened up here in Parque das Tribos”, she said.

Samia also explained that the city government is only doing “make up” work where one of the landslides is taking place. “This work that they are doing will be of no use, because while it rains the crater will continue to open and it is risky even for someone to be passing by at the moment and fall into one of these holes. Even a car has already fallen into this erosion and they are just making up for it, but I’m sure it won’t do any good”, he said.

Abandonment

The secretary also regretted that no public transportation passes through the area. “It’s a good thing that the school year is over, because there are no school buses, the garbage truck is also not passing and the population is throwing the garbage where it can, it is very difficult to live with this reality”, she said. About the second stage of the community that also has another landslide, even bigger than the first, Samia said that it is very dangerous for those who live near the landslide.

“They only do a quick resurfacing, it’s not a quality job, there are streets within the community that almost no bicycles pass, we have wheelchair users in Parque das Tribos, people who are sick and need medical attention and, if we call the Mobile Emergency Care Service (Samu), they don’t come here. So, we are clamoring for quality assistance”, Samia asked.

Another resident who preferred not to be identified reported that she has a child with a syndrome that needs physiotherapeutic care and that in order to take the child to the doctor it is necessary to climb a steep hill, which makes it difficult to access the city’s public transportation. “Since when I arrived here, the street was at the height of my house, now the street is at the bottom and my house is further up. Besides, the difficulty of taking my son to physiotherapy is very complicated, not to mention when he gets sick in the middle of the night, that we have to go all the way around to get access”, she said.

Positioning

In a statement, the Municipal Department of Infrastructure (Seminf) said that the Parque das Tribos community has been served within its priorities. “We emphasize that public lighting already serves the site, recently the Manaus City Hall disclosed that the water utility company is studying the implementation of a drinking water supply network, and in the basic infrastructure some streets have already received actions such as earthworks and asphalt”, said an excerpt from the note.

The secretariat also points out that the community is undergoing a major infrastructure work on the access road and will continue to be assisted with improvements in the remaining streets; the work follows within Seminf’s schedule.