By Daniela Fichino
The installation was made by the Alliance of People Affected by Vale, which also participates in the meeting to expose to shareholders practices of violations and mismanagement of the company.
Rio de Janeiro – The headquarters of Vale S.A., in the district of Botafogo, dawned with a memorial in honor of the victims of the tailings dam’s rupture at Corrego deFeijão, in Brumadinho. The action takes place on the day that Vale holds its first Shareholders’ Meeting after the catastrophe. The Alliance of People Affected by Vale distributed 233 plaques with the names of the fatal victims, and 37 plaques with the names of people still missing, as a result of the disaster caused by the company. The initiative seeks to prevent the pain of the hundreds of hardest hit families from falling into oblivion, and to demand an effective positioning of those who can actually act on the conduct of the company: its shareholders.
A group of critical shareholders, who are members of the Alliance, will attend the meeting, which started today, April 30th, at 10:00 am. Within it, the shareholders will request the rejection of the Management Report regarding the company’s activities in the last period, in addition to demanding the complete shutdown of Vale’s mining activities as well the complete dismissal of its management. Such measures, according to the shareholders, are necessary in view of the complete indetermination of the risk inherent to Vale’s activities. Alone in Minas Gerais, the mining company cannot provide an accurate report on the security conditions of 17 dams; about 1,000 people were displaced from their homes, with no deadline to return due to widespread politics of insecurity and fear carried out by the company.
For the shareholders, the continuity of the company’s current board would mean an obstacle to investigations of the crime in Brumadinho. The situation of insecurity and rights violations also extends to other areas where Vale operates, impacting entire populations to the North and Northeast of the country.
