The Anace Indigenous people are protesting TikTok's construction of the largest data center in Brazil

"Before getting into the details, Roberto Ytaysaba, who is from Brazil, wants to make one thing perfectly clear: neither he nor the Anace Indigenous people, whom he leads, are against progress. We're not against progress if it respects the communities, nature, spirituality, the autonomy of [native] peoples and Convention 169, he clarifies, one recent morning in his village. They've had electricity here since the 1980s. The school teaches ethnomathematics to the children."

"And, recently, the village inaugurated a clinic specifically for Indigenous people, something that's the envy of this region in the arid northeast of Brazil. However, as so often in recent centuries, a threat looms over them. This project is an invasion, just like the Portuguese invasion in 1500, what they called the discovery,' this Anace chief warns. Born in 1976 in a hammock, he's known as Chief Roberto."

"As he speaks, a pleasant breeze tempers the heat. The traditional lands of the Anace are located in Caucaia, a municipality which is part of the Fortaleza metropolitan area. After resisting the Portuguese here, between the 17th and 18th centuries what the colonizers' chronicles referred to as the War of the Barbarians they now face a formidable 21st-century adversary: TikTok, one of the world's most popular social media platforms."

Chief Roberto Ytaysaba and the Anace Indigenous people accept progress that respects communities, nature, spirituality, autonomy and ILO Convention 169. The village has had electricity since the 1980s, teaches ethnomathematics, and recently opened a clinic for Indigenous people. The community views TikTok's planned mega-data center on their traditional Caucaia lands as an invasion comparable to the 1500 Portuguese arrival. The Anace recall resisting colonizers during the War of the Barbarians. The community has mobilized lawyers, NGOs and the Public Prosecutor's Office to oppose the Chinese company over feared negative impacts on their land and rights.

Read at english.elpais.com