Belo Horizonte: Kasa Invisível, Solidarity, Direct Action, and Self-Determination

An Occupied Social Center Becomes a Hub of Mutual Aid in Belo Horizonte, Brazi.

Through interviews with the founders and participants, we explore how an occupied social center and housing collective in Brazil has continued to function as a hub for mutual aid through the pandemic. This is the third installment in a series exploring mutual aid projects around the world in the era of covid-19.

The Zapatistas have said the best solidarity anyone can offer is to start their own social centers, projects, movements, and revolutions wherever they are based. In Belo Horizonte, the capital city of the state of Minas Gerais in southeastern Brazil, a collective called Kasa Invisível (Portuguese for “Invisible House”) has heeded that proposal, and hopes to inspire you to do the same.

The three formerly abandoned houses now occupied by this autonomous, anti-capitalist collective serve as a home for people in need, a social and cultural center for the community, and a meeting and organizing space for anti-authoritarian resistance and mutual aid. While there are hundreds of building and land occupations in Minas Gerais alone, Kasa is one of only a few squats in the region that explicitly exist to support struggles against the state and capitalism. [Read More]

Belo Horizonte (Brazil): For Squat Kasa Invisível, keep your support, we’re almost there!

First of all, we want to thank every one, every collective, union, and groups supporting us! We already reached almost 2,000 dolars to fix the entire roof of our squat. Keep sharing the message to those which are in a position to help us keep our work and our house! Stay safe and healthy!

Video Campaign:

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Belo Horizonte (Brazil): The feminist squat Tina Martins threatened with eviction

 

On March 8th, the feminist movement Olga Benário squatted an empty building in the center of Belo Horizonte, with the hope of turning it into a crisis shelter for female victims of violence. Since then, the building is occupied as a place of living for dozens of women, and holds every day gatherings, assemblies, culturals and political events. It also works as a self-managed crisis shelter: a psychological and medical reception center for more or less 200 women who are homeless or victims of violence.

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