n a i l i z a r B y c a r c o m de k c a t t a r unde With Brazil challenged by a neglectful and confusing response to Coronavirus and besieged by a president who supports a return to military rule, CONOR FOLEY explains the events that have led Brazil to this critical threshold.
On
April 24th 2020, 2018 Jair Bolsonaro the President of Brazil sacked the head of the federal police force after learning that an investigation had been opened into one of his sons for inciting a demonstration calling for the military to shut down Congress and the Supreme Court. A few days before this Bolsonaro had sacked his own health minister, Luiz Mandetta, for refusing to back calls that shops and schools must reopen in the midst of a rapidly rising death toll during the Coronavirus pandemic. Bolsonaro was also reportedly irritated with Mandetta´s criticisms that he was refusing to observe ´social distancing´ advice, going walkabout in crowded areas and hugging his supporters during repeated demonstrations demanding the return of military rule. There are a number of ongoing investigations related to Bolsonaro´s family. One concerns another son who allegedly embezzled State funds to finance illegal construction carried out by right-wing ´militia´ groups in Rio de Janeiro. Another is one who gave the order to assassinate a left-wing Assembly member in Rio, Marielle Franco, which was allegedly carried out by two of Bolsonaro´s associates. Bolsonaro´s Minister of Justice, Sérgio Moro, resigned from office in response to the sacking of the chief of police, alleging that the President was interfering in an ongoing criminal investigation. Brazil´s Supreme Court
On the eve of his election Bolsonaro released a statement in which he promised to imprison his political opponents and echoed a slogan from the dictatorship era: ‘Brazil, love it or leave it’
anphoblacht UIMHIR EISIÚNA 2 - 2020 - ISSUE NUMBER 2
has also blocked Bolsonaro´s attempts to put his own nominees in both positions. Bolsonaro is a former military officer who won the Presidency in October 2018. His notoriety comes from a series of bizarrely offensive statements during his career. He told a fellow legislator that she was too ugly for him to rape her; said that he would rather his son died than accept him as gay; repeatedly taunted black people, indigenous communities and the poor; and said that the dictatorship’s only mistake was that it did not kill enough people. When casting his vote for the impeachment of former President Dilma Rousseff in 2016, Bolsonaro dedicated it to the memory of the dictatorship’s chief torturer whose victims included Dilma herself. On the eve of his election Bolsonaro released a statement in which he promised to imprison his political 41
