The community of the city of Peruíbe,
on the Southeast coast of Brazil,
has spent months mobilized against
the installation of a 1.7 gigawatt,
gas-fired power-plant,
which would generate
a lot of environmental and social damage.
The fight resulted in the approval
of an amendment to the law of the municipality,
which prevents the installation of polluting
and acid rain-causing industries.
We, from the association, we always said:
folks, this isn't going to be great.
It's not a good thing.
They say it will bring jobs but it isn't true.
We won't have all these opportunities
they are presenting to us.
So let's participate, let's join the fight,
because this isn't going to be positive,
especially in our region.
The place where the power plant was going to be built
is very close to our neighborhood,
so for us it wasn't going to be very nice.
[It would cause us] respiratory problems,
acid rain, without mentioning water -
we would have big problems with water.
So, for these reasons, we embraced the cause.
I was actually the first city councillor
to get involved in this action.
The moment this topic started
being discussed in the city council,
I expressed my position at the podium,
being completely against it,
precisely because of the features
that brought me to this city:
the quality of the air,
and whole natural environment where I live, in Guaraú.
And we had a very difficult voting session,
heated from the start.
I believe that the engagement
not only by the population, but also by groups
of people who gave testimony,
was very important for our success.
We [need to remember that]
we are here in the middle of
marine and land conservation areas.
We're in a region
where there's a big deficit in public services,
both in sanitation and healthcare.
We wrote a report, as a result,
against these power-plant plans.
We managed to leverage the benefit
that social networks brings to society;
that is to unite who are far away [from each other].
We united different people, from different places,
with different ways of thinking, different religions.
We managed to mobilize a big movement;
we ended up having a beautiful celebration.
It will be remembered, and unforgettable
and it will be an example to other cities,
that fight against this kind of project.
It was a beautiful victory.
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