鈥楯ust because we are poor, it doesn鈥檛 mean we don鈥檛 want things to be
beautiful here,鈥� said Severina Euega, standing over a rubbish-strewn open
sewer on the steep hillside of Rocinha, Rio鈥檚 largest favela, or shanty
town.
President of the Women鈥檚 Association of Rocinha, she organised one of
a series of weekend walking tours for summit delegates and journalists through
the settlement, which has a population of around 250 000. Rocinha has ramshackle
and partly illegal electricity supplies and intermittent water supply but
no closed sewers, only three schools and two small health clinics.
Police had rounded up hundreds of Rio鈥檚 street children before the summit,
she said, and dumped them in favelas such as Rocinha.
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Meanwhile, Pedro Mendonca, President of the Federation of Favela Dwellers
of Rio, demanded to be allowed to present the case of the urban poor to
the Earth Summit. Delivered by environ-mental groups, including Greenpeace,
this demand went without reply.
Rio has at least 545 favelas, most of them are small encampments on
steep hillsides surrounding the city. The shanty towns contain about a fifth
of the city鈥檚 population.
