A tribute to the Jonia Maria Fank

In the early hours of the day on December 26, 2023 went to our friend and fellow Jonia Maria Fank, in his home city of Venancio Aires, Rio Grande do Sul, at the age of 57.

The news has rocked the colleagues and the friends that he made over the course of more than 30 years of the indigenous movement in the Indigenist Missionary Council (CIMI), and after the Operation, the Amazon-Native (OPAN). To engage in the struggle from an early age, he worked in the Ministry of Youth, in Venâncio Aires, and, in 1989, he was invited by Therese Weber and We Kroemer to team up with the people’s Suruwaha, in the south of the Amazon river.

He completed a course of training in the indigenist missionary council, and in the 1990s, along with Edineia the Door, Mara Lúcia Oliveira, Mário Lúcio, became a part of the team that implemented the Project, Suruwaha, established in 1984, the programme of action for the indigenous people and the protection of the territory of the people in recent contact with, which was the first, and the most consistent materials of the ethnographic over the Suruwaha up to that time. In 2021, he told the friend, Have a part in this history of the article “new perspective for the indigenous peoples of the isolated, low-touch”, in the book New insights Indian.

The OPAN, Jonia is dedicated to the management of the partnership between the OPAN and the National Health Foundation (Funasa), which he attended from 1999 to 2010, and the people Enawene Nawe, Myky, and the Manoki, in the northwestern part of the state of Mato Grosso.

As the executive secretary of the Forum, a Popular social and Environmental-of-state of Mato Grosso (From), he was one of the organizers of the Project in Mato Grosso, Sustainable, and Democratic elections held in the year 2000, in the collection of data and monitoring of the sustainability of democracy in the state, the results of which were published in 2006, the articles on agriculture, mining, water resources, protected areas, and environmental education.

He moved to Castanhal, Pará, where he worked as a teacher, and in 2016, he returned to the head office of the OPAN to Cuiabá as the finance manager. In 2018, he assumed the leadership of the sector, and in this position he remained until the end of 2020. In 2021 and 2022, he was the director-treasurer of OPAN.

There are plenty of stories of the companions, it was hosted by Jonia at her arrival at the institution over the years. Along with other colleagues, rio grande do sul, was a newcomer to a certain wheel mate in the head office of the OPAN, in Cuiabá, in the morning. Well-known for placements, strong, and always be considered in the care of the body and the mind, they were met with the courage to fight against the cancer that was discovered in 2019. It was an example of determination and serenity at every stage of the treatment.

At the time, had a passion to move to the Chapada dos Guimarães (MT) to Natal (RN), and realize your dream of living by the sea. But by mid-2023 decided to go back to Venancio Aires, rio grande do sul), with the worsening of the disease. The daughter of Virena, and Sebastian’s younger sister, Sergio, and Magic, and the aunt of the Names, Raphael, and Swim, Jonia leave the legacy of someone who, with determination and a free-spirited and conquered what we planned, but without losing hope, and your courage.

We wish you a lot of strength to the family and friends of Jonia at this difficult time.

May he rest in peace, friend.’

The team OPAN