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On October 6, the special police unit of Rio de Janeiro performs a patrol during a security operation in the favela of Complexo do Alemao (Mauro Pimentel / AFP / Getty Images).
Anthony Faiola
Correspondent covering Latin America, Venezuela, Argentina, Brazil, human rights, poverty, globalization and the economy
RIO DE JANEIRO – Brazil emerged from the shadow of a military dictatorship more than three decades ago, leaving behind an era of torture and extrajudicial executions. Now, this country is about to choose a former army captain who has pledged to bring his own iron fist regime back to the presidency.
Jair Bolsonaro, 63, was very poetic about the generals who ruled Brazil from 1964 to 1985. Their main fault, he said, is that they did not kill enough dissidents. If he wins, he is committed to filling his cabinet with retired officers, throwing leftists into jail, banning land rights groups, spreading ideas. schools and to encourage the police to use lethal force.
A fistful of iron, however, is exactly what some Brazilians seem to want. The polls show that, faced with polls, the sinking of the dictatorship has given birth to the frenzy of crime, the sluggish economy and the enormous political corruption. They describe it as a period of law and order as the greatest nation in Latin America thrives.
A man listens to Brazil's national anthem at a campaign rally for Jair Bolsonaro on Copacabana beach in Rio de Janeiro on Sunday. (Leo Correa / AP)
At a rally in Rio de Janeiro on Sunday, supporters of Bolsonaro fervently applauded a vehicle carrying heavily armed soldiers as part of an offensive to pacify the slums of this violent city. "Woo-hoo! Let's go boys! Take them! A woman shouted, wearing a t-shirt with the portrait of Bolsonaro, representing the godfather of Francis Ford Coppola.
"It's really frustrating, man," said the Brazilian singer Geraldo Azevedo, who was jailed and tortured for 41 days under the dictatorship, told the audience last weekend. "I was jailed twice during the dictatorship. I was tortured You do not know what is torture. All the joy you feel now will disappear, do you know? Brazil will become terrible if this man wins. "
[Brazil’s presidential election goes to a second round with far-right candidate in the lead]
In 1999, Bolsonaro – then a marginal legislator – delivered a fiery speech in which he pledged, when he became president, to ask the army to take control of the nation. First day". He has since returned these words – and has frequently been engaged in recent months to defend democracy.
But his son and advisor – legislator Eduardo Bolsonaro – recently suggested that soldiers could close the Supreme Court if he was trying to prevent his father from taking office. Jair Bolsonaro won a first round of voting earlier this month and now votes in front of his leftist opponent, Fernando Haddad, 12 percentage points as he enters the second round this weekend. Speaking at a rally in Sao Paulo last Sunday, the candidate launched a litany of threats.
He promised that Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, the former Brazilian left-wing president, who is serving a 12-year prison sentence for corruption, "would rot in prison." Haddad, suggested Bolsonaro, could join him behind bars. He threatened to declare the Landless Workers Movement, a large-scale social movement known for its dementia with the big landowners, a terrorist organization. He declared the season open to leftists.
"Either they go abroad or they go to jail," Bolsonaro said. "These red outlaws will be banished from our homeland. It will be a cleanup unprecedented in the history of Brazil. "
[How Jair Bolsonaro entranced Brazil’s minorities — while also insulting them]
Models of firearms and police vehicles are on display Tuesday in the congressional office of Eduardo Bolsonaro, son and advisor of the candidate, in Brasilia. (Sergio Lima / Bloomberg News)
Since the beginning, Bolsonaro's candidacy has been imbued with militarism. His second, Hamilton Mourão, is a four-star retired general, infamous for his critics of democracy. Last year, during a speech in Brasilia, Bolsonaro lamented the state of Brazilian democracy by saying, "When we observe with fear and sadness what happens, we say," Why do not we destroy everything this? ".
If he wins, Bolsonaro should appoint military leaders to the ministries of defense, infrastructure and education. These departments have a combined budget of $ 66 billion, one-fifth of total government expenditures.
For the Minister of Education, analysts expect Bolsonaro to appeal to retired General Alessio Souto, who defended a "military intervention" to "put democracy back on a proper path". He should aggressively push Bolsonaro's plan for "no party" schools – a program that would effectively prohibit teachers from espousing political views in classrooms.
"It is essentially a right-wing ideological patrol, because they explained that Brazilian teachers and teachers still tried to indoctrinate children as leftists," said Guilherme Casarões, a professor of compared to Getulio Vargas. Foundation, a university in Sao Paulo.
The right-wing dictatorship of Brazil was far less deadly than those of neighboring Argentina and Chile. Nevertheless, at least 434 people were killed or "disappeared" while the army was in control. Torture techniques included the holding of dummy crucifixions of dissidents.
Unlike other regimes in Latin America, Brazilian military leaders tried to retain the appearance of democracy after taking power in 1964. The presidency was a group of generals and the Congress remained open. although it worked largely as a buffer. The elections were rigged and most political parties were abolished.
[In Brazil, nostalgia grows for the dictatorship]
The dictatorship has aggravated economic inequalities due to the lowering of workers' rights, the minimum wage and higher wages in the upper strata of society. Corruption was widespread, but censorship of the press meant that the public was rarely informed of scandals. Denouncing wrongdoing could result in imprisonment, torture and death.
Messages and names of people arrested during the military dictatorship from 1964 to 1985 are visible on Monday on the wall of a Sao Paulo Resistance Memorial cell, a former political prison. (Paulo Whitaker / Reuters)
"Bolsonaro sells the idea that there was no corruption under the scheme. But there was corruption and a good part, but none that the press can denounce, "said Jorge Ferreira, a historian who wrote books on the dictatorship.
Critics fear that Bolsonaro will call generals for support in the event of a constitutional crisis or attempted impeachment. But it is not clear if they would answer. Experts say this institution has matured since military rule in 1985 – and that its leaders have little interest in political intervention.
"I think analysts who say Brazil will have a coup under Bolsonaro are doing their analysis from the Washington offices," said Lucas de Aragão, director of Arko Advice, a political risk company. from Brasilia. "It's not going to happen.The army in Brazil has no more power program."
The army remains one of the most respected institutions in the country. About 78% of Brazilians trust the armed forces, compared to 31% who think the same thing about the Congress.
"While Brazilian politics was in moral ruin, the military remained outside, they did not engage and won the highest levels of prestige and trust of the people. All this has been beneficial for Bolsonaro, "said Paulo Chagas, retired Brazilian general and politician.
The Brazilian era of democracy has been tarnished by corruption and mismanagement of his political class. Since 1985, two elected presidents have been indicted and a former leader has been imprisoned. The incumbent President, Michel Temer, is on indictment for money laundering, a charge he denies.
The checkpoint of the Brazilian army in the favela of Vila Kennedy in Rio de Janeiro in March. (Lianne Milton for the Washington Post)
At the same time, millions of Brazilians have become increasingly frightened. Homicide rates have reached record levels as urban slums become gang-friendly grounds.
Some experts say that Bolsonaro's crackdown proposals, including encouraging the police to use lethal force against criminals and relaxing gun laws to allow civilians to fight fire with fire, will only Intensify the bloodbath, especially in the slums of the country.
But even here, many are clamoring for the type of politics at the iron hand promised by Bolsonaro.
"I vote for him because he will fight drug trafficking," said Osvaldo da Torres, 60, an evangelical minister serving in Rocinha, Rio's largest slum. "Every day, someone here dies. It is very important that people who own a firearm know that if they commit a crime, they will be severely punished. "
"He used to be in the army," Torres said. "He understands."
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