Indigenous communities, together with Afro-descendant, migrant and diversity organizations presented a collective complaint against the General Auditor Miguel Pichetto at the National Institute against Discrimination, Xenophobia and Racism (Inadi), accusing him of promoting a “racist, discriminatory and denialist” against the Mapuche people and the original peoples.
The complaint, which has more than 220 signatures of indigenous people and communities, social and human rights groups, and academic personalities and artists, was presented at the Inadi headquarters, in the City of Buenos Aires by members of the Mapuche, Charrúa, Quechua and Afro-descendant peoples, on behalf of the Plurinational Meeting of Argentina.
The complainants were received by Natalia Mengual, Complaints Reception and Evaluation Coordinator, and by Andrea González, Director of Victim Assistance, who formally received the complaint and indicated to those present the steps to follow.
The lonko of the Mapuche Community Nahuel Payún, Oscar Farías, from the Buenos Aires city of Junín, Télam indicated that “the racial hate speech carried out by Pichetto in the media greatly affects our people and exposes others at risk of being verbally or physically attacked, in the face of public statements of a public servant”.
In addition, he pointed out that “this racist, discriminatory and denialist campaign against the Mapuche people takes us back to the extermination campaign that Julio Argentino Roca and others carried out, where people also disappeared and appropriated our ‘pichikeches’ (boys and girls) to be used as servants by the wealthy families of that time”.
Pichetto, current member of the General Audit of the Nation, declared last February 22 that “the Mapuche people are invaders” and that “luckily (Julio Argentino) Roca appeared and campaigned in the desert.”
“The Mapuche people are an invading people, they are not native to Argentina, they are native to Chile. Luckily, Roca appeared in Argentina and Patagonia is Argentine because of Roca“He came to say in the framework of an interview with Urbana Play radio.
The complainants point out in the document that these racial hate speeches “put them face to face with a paradigmatic situation in Argentina precisely on the 40th anniversary of the recovery of Democracy, which is why it is essential that the political references of our country have real training in Rights of the Indigenous Peoples and thus avoid these situations”.
For his part, Mamay Kantuta Killa, member of the Council of Indigenous Healers of Argentina (Cosindia) explained to this agency that “Pichetto defends the crime by violating the anti-discrimination law.”
Law 23,592, against acts of discrimination, states in its article 3: “Those who participate in an organization or carry out propaganda based on ideas or theories of superiority of a race or a group of people will be punished with imprisonment from one month to three years.” of a certain religion, ethnic origin or color, which have as their object the justification or promotion of racial or religious discrimination in any form”.
