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© 2021 Luiz C. Ribeiro
The land belonging to the Pataxó Hãhãhãe is very large and families live very dispersed. They are approx. 3 thousand Indians, spread over an area of 54,105 thousand hectares, bordering the municipality of Pau Brasil, Camacan and Itaju do Colônias. To this group belonged the Indian Galdino Jesus dos Santos, who was burned alive while sleeping in a shelter of a bus stop in Brasília, after participating in the demonstrations of the Day of the Indian in 1997, in a crime that shocked Brazil. The crime was committed by five young upper-middle class men from that city. There are many nuclei and the structure is very similar to a rural community. The group's social organization is divided into three or four ethnic groups and six chiefs, but this division is somewhat dispersed, many recent conflicts have caused some demobilization of the collective organization. The community is made up of 3 villages: Caramuru, Bahetá and Panelão, which belongs to the Pataxó Hãhãhãe People. Pataxó Hãhãhãe are made up of the Baenã, Pataxó Hãhãhãe, Kamakã, Tupinambá, Kariri-Sapuyá and Gueren ethnic groups. Inhabitants of the south of Bahia state, the contact history of these groups with non-indigenous populations has been shaped by land expropriations, forced relocations, the transmission of diseases and killings. The land reserved for them by the State in 1926 was invaded and largely converted into private farms. The slow and tortuous process of regaining these lands began in the 1980s only: a successful conclusion still appears to be some way off, with the reserve remaining under judicial consideration. Pataxó Hãhãhãe ancestral land near Pau Brasil, South of Bahia estate. Pau Brasil, South of Bahia estate, the Rio da Prata river once a clean source of water for the Pataxo now receives dejects of the growing city.