Favela is a Portuguese word for a slum Due to the poverty in which the inhabitants of these slums live, they lack many of the requirements of modern and modern life, and the slums suffer from a lack of infrastructure. Houses are built on the surface of mountains and hills in unplanned lands by the government and are subject to removal and removal whenever the government is able to do so, and informal settlements are built from stones, cement, pieces of wood and metal remnants, and are widely spread in large cities and Brazilian capitals and large cities with strong economic movement and warm weather. Most favela residents are considered poor or below the poverty line.
The origin of the tale
Due to the economic conditions in Brazil Many citizens have suffered from poverty and limited income and have adapted to their situation in various ways, The number of informal settlements and illegal housing complexes has reached more than 1800 random, densely populated The population of some of them reaches about 70,000 people, and organized crime is widespread through gangs, drug mafia and graft methods, so they live in complete isolation from the external oceans, and they have no educational institutions except for pre-school education, so ignorance and illiteracy are widespread among the population.
The Brazilian city of Rio de Janeiro is considered one of the most beautiful cities in the world due to its charming nature and the inclusion of rivers for its waist, such as Leblon Beach and Ipanema Beach, and is considered one of the most famous tourist areas in Brazil, but it is crowded on the other side with informal settlements that the residents adhere to and consider it a red line.
The beginning of the adventure
Amlak newspaper delegation headed by the editor-in-chief Mr. Abdulaziz Al-Issa visited Brazil earlier this month to explore what informal settlements are, how they live, and what the government's role is in addressing their conditions and correcting their housing situation. They agreed to visit government-controlled informal settlements because, as they put it, it was a risky venture. The delegation's warning against Any other moves.
The delegation headed to Sint Maarta, the first government-controlled slum near the capital, Brasilia, an open area with a very low risk and a population of 7,000 people. Other warnings were taken not to talk to residents and walk quickly, not to photograph in certain places, and to pay attention to the delegation's movement so that residents do not feel that someone is spying on them, or have an uncomfortable feeling of the presence of a stranger.
Government Efforts to Upgrade Informal Settlements
The delegation learned that the Brazilian government is making great efforts to control these informal settlements, and has succeeded in only 42 informal settlements, so it worked to improve their conditions and relocate some of those who wished to move to other more suitable and safer places, and connected water and electricity networks (60 amps per house) at a nominal fee and provided conveyors and electric elevators to transport residents free of charge from the bottom of the hill to the top from 6:00 am to 12:00 midnight. It also installed cable car lines and provided residents with internet access. free of charge, and a cell phone network.
It incentivized children to study by subsidizing them with R$200 (US$67). The government approved trains and buses to transport students from the top of the mountain to schools in other regions.
It prevented the horizontal expansion of the informal settlements it controlled while encouraging vertical expansion. Government efforts went even further by building free housing for them and relocating them away from the informal settlements. This is in addition to Infrastructure such as drainage and waterways.
Models and fusion Peoples of the world
In Brazil in general, there are different nationalities from all nationalities and continents, and you see in one street different personalities and multiple colors from all parts of the world, due to the steady growth of the Brazilian economy and the ease of integration into society and the flexibility of conditions for those who want to invest and own property, and there are many foreigners residing in Brazil whose destination was America and Canada, but the country of «Samba» attracted them and appealed to them for them to reside in the country. The Brazilian government allowed them to naturalize and enter the political arena through parliament.
The economics of informal settlements
The informal settlements suffer from a clear lack of infrastructure, which made their residents look for sources of livelihood in other places in neighboring cities with low wages, which made the danger of gangs and mafia dominate the public environment and practice many colors of illegal trade, with drugs at the top of the list, followed by the arms trade, which you find widespread among informal settlements residents for protection and self-defense and family.
There are no specific and recognizable types of investment in the slums except for a few scattered restaurants here and there, barbershops and buffets. The percentage of the rich among them is 40%. They are kind and friendly to the rest of the population and consider themselves a state within a state, but with no administrative organization and no political powers. Their situation was unknown or almost non-existent until US President Obama visited them on his airplane, which brought them to the attention of the government and the media. They were also visited by Queen Elizabeth of Britain and Michael Jackson, in addition to the economic dimension represented by the recent World Cup in Brazil, where Brazilian visitors and top soccer players considered the slums as a tourist destination to believe with their own eyes what they heard about human beings living in isolation from civilization and civilization. Some informal settlements have also been fertile ground for American movies.
Brazil's economy
Brazil's economy is one of the fastest growing economies in the world, the sixth most powerful economy in the world and the seventh largest economy by nominal GDP. Its economy depends on the industrial boom that occurred during the past few decades, as well as oil extraction and the industrialization of its products, in addition to the agricultural sector for which Brazil is famous, especially in the cultivation of coffee and fruit, and it has a wide investment activity in the livestock sector, which increased the output of national income, in addition to the commercial aspect in which Brazil excelled thanks to the multiplicity of nationalities and nationalities, which gave it many outlets for communication with the countries of its immigrant citizens. The active labor force includes more than 100 million Brazilians They work in Brazil's agricultural, industrial, commercial and service economy.
Brazilian Arabs
South America in general, and Brazil in particular, has witnessed large Arab migrations that began long ago but increased between the two world wars in the 1930s and 1940s, and the periods of the civil war in Lebanon witnessed large influxes of Lebanese to Brazil. Brazil's Arab population With a population of more than 10 million people, they represent a powerful economic force Brazil, and have played important and influential roles in South American life, starting with former Argentine President Carlos Menem which even popular singer Shakira.
Carlos Slim (the son of Lebanese immigrants) is the richest man in Latin America and the founder of Mexico's telecommunications revolution. Joseph Safra of Lebanon, owner of the ninth-largest bank in Brazil, is the second richest Arab, with an estimated wealth of more than $11.4 billion. The al-Mufaraj family owns the elegant Sheraton Hotel in São Paulo, where more Arabs live with their customs and traditions than in Beirut. Business tycoon Paulo Maalouf was a former governor of the city.
Amlak Team Blogs«
Money is not the only thing that gives life. !!!
This is the state of some of the residents who received the newspaper's delegation, who, despite the modesty of the place they live in, love it with a love that is buried in their hearts and we notice it in their facial expressions and gazes, and they tend to write on the walls They draw their own satirical and expressive drawings like Yansky« - Anonymous - who expresses thousands of people with his satirical art He paints at night, only to surprise passersby with his paintings on the walls in the morning.
Slum dwellers enjoy With a strong sense of belonging to their areas, you can feel the intimacy and friendliness that dominates the nature of the relationships between them, despite the lack of money and the poverty that covers the place. .
The sight of students in their uniforms and coming out of school draws the attention of passersby. No noise, which suggests their love and implementation of school regulations.
There is a large police presence in the random streets of St. Martina, which we visited to curb crime and clear the area of suspects. However, people hear the occasional gunshot, and the presence of a dead body is not a triggering event to call the police. In the meantime, the delegation, in a spirit of adventure that only gets more exciting as we delve deeper into the facts, was able to From visiting some of the firing sites and seeing the effects on the walls and debris Throwing bullets.
Residents of Sint Martina say that the informal settlements here are more than eighty years old. We build our houses with great difficulty and hardship, carrying building materials, iron and cement from the bottom of the mountain to the top and ascending it through carved stairs that may reach up to 200 steps. Dogs are seen in the streets and on top of buildings, and there are basketball courts on the roof of the mountain.
On one of Amlak's tours from one of the informal settlements, they were caught between two demonstrations, so they walked among the columns of people who clogged the streets, and were unable to leave the demonstration until after a long distance, and one of the two demonstrations was scattered.
