Nothing by Accident : Brazil On The Edge – book by Damian Platt

Brazil excites one’s mind with images of football, carnival, samba and copacabana. The world sees Brazilians as cheerful, lively and joyous people. The tourists are swept off their feet by the picturesque beaches and the spectacular sugarloaf mountain view of the marvellous city of Rio. But, later in the night when they switch on the TV channels, they are shocked by the gruesome images of violence, gang wars, police and ambulance sirens and pile of dead bodies in the favelas (slums), which are not far from the hotels and beaches. More shock follows with the statistics of murders and deaths in police encounters which make Rio as one of the most dangerous cities in the world. According to the Brazilian Forum for Public Security, there were 65,602 violent killings in the country during 2017. In 2018, killings by police in Brazil stood at 6,220—in Rio alone that year. Brazil has one of the highest murder rates with firearms in the world.

So one starts wondering how so much violence has come to coexist with the carioca (resident of Rio) happy- go- lucky spirit. According to Damian Platt, the author of the book (published in August 2020), the crime and violence are not accidental but are designed and perpetuated by the deadly combination of criminal gangs, rogue police and military officials and their political patrons.

 

Platt explains the origin and evolution of the violence in Rio and Brazil. He traces the origin to the illegal lottery sytem called as ‘jogos de bichos’ (animal games) run by bicheiros (lottery operators). It is based on a sequence of 25 numbers with pictures of animals which allows you to bet as much or as little as you wish on any combination of numbers you choose. This lottery system was invented by a flamboyant entrepreneur Baron de Drummond in 1892 . He had opened a zoo in a new residential neighbourhood ‘Vila Isabel’ he had developed on the northern edges of Rio. In order to attract visitors to the zoo, he started a raffle with the entrance tickets which carried the pictures of animals. Winners earned a cash prize twenty times the value of the entrance fee. Visitors to the zoo multiplied and Vila Isabel flourished. Police were deployed to maintain order on the overcrowded trams transporting the public to the zoo. People visited the zoo to bet on the jogo de bicho, rather than look at animals. With a view to save gamblers from the trip, the Baron organised ticket sales in the centre of town. The innocent raffle had quickly outstripped its original purpose and became wildly popular. The government imposed ban on the jogo as an anti-gambling moral policy. This forced the lottery to go underground. Individual entrepreneurs got into the operation of the illegal lottery which became even more popular. The law considered the illegal lottery as a simple misdemeanour and there was no serious prosecution or punishment. The lottery operators resorted to bribery, favours and alliances with political leaders and security forces, to guarantee their business. Newspapers published daily results, both explicitly and covertly, while individuals within the police force and the local authorities developed an interest in maintaining the lottery for their illicit personal financial gain. The bicheiros became the patrons of samba groups participating in the carnival. In their VIP boxes, they entertained presidents, ministers, governors, generals, chiefs of police, celebrities and television stars. Later in the seventies, the bicheiros got into drug distribution when cocaine arrived at Rio on transit to Europe. The bicheiros used their underground lottery network for drug distribution to the thrill-seeking local jetset. They took the help of off-duty and retired police and military men for protection. In Rio de Janeiro and across Brazil, most military police work on a shift basis, often with 48 hour breaks between police duties. Consequently, it is standard practice to take second jobs as security guards, as they have the right to carry weapons. Most of the private security firms are owned and staffed by off-duty or former police and military officers. 

 

The military dictatorship from 1964 to 1983 added a new dimension to the illegal lottery racket. The military intelligence used the bicheiro network to collect information and infiltrate the underground leftist groups. As a quid pro quo, the military officers gave protection and immunity to the bicheiros. Some of the officers joined the illegal lottery network and made personal fortunes. 

 

The criminal military and police elements who flourished during the dictatorship did not like the return to democracy in 1985. Some of them formed secret groups and tried to sabotage democratization through terrorist actions, but without success. Some others formed militias which ran rackets of protection, extortion and contract killings. The militias succeeded in finding new patrons among civilian politicians such as Jair Bolsonaro and his sons. The militias finance election campaigns and help politicians to get votes. In return, the elected leaders provide political cover to the militias. Fabricio Queiroz , a militia member on the run from prosecution was arrested eventually from the beach house of the family lawyer of Bolsonaro. When a journalist asked Bolsonaro why Queiroz paid money into the personal accounts of the wife of Bolsonaro, the president threatened to punch the face of the journalist. Queiroz was chief of staff of Flavio Bolsonaro from 2007 to 2018. The alleged assassins of Marielle Franco, a popular political activist of Rio were reported to have had links to the Bolsonaro family. The Justice Minister Sergio Moro resigned earlier this year protesting against the interference of President Bolsonaro in these investigations to protect his family. 

 

In 2008, a then-obscure Rio politician and former army captain, Jair Bolsonaro, defended militias in a BBC interview, claiming they provided security, order and discipline for poor communities. In 2005, Flavio Bolsonaro successfully petitioned to award a police officer turned militiaman Adriano da Nobrega the state of Rio’s highest honour, the Tiradentes medal, which he delivered personally to the disgraced policeman – inside prison. 

 

In other Latin American countries, the military men who committed atrocities during dictatorships were brought before justice and convicted. But the Brazilian military torturers and killers got away  with their crimes. The impunity has encouraged the criminal captains and colonels to continue to undermine democracy even now. Bolsonaro had dedicated his vote for impeachment of President Dilma Rouseff to the notorious Colonel Ustra who tortured her when she was caught as a leftwing guerilla fighter. He called Ustra as a national hero. During his first official visit to Chile, President Bolsonaro praised Pinochet dictatorship causing embarrassment to the democratic citizens and politicians of Chile. Bolsonaro keeps repeating his statements for killing of communists and maintains that not enough were killed during the dictatorship. In a TV interview in 1999, Congress member Bolsonaro said that the only way of "changing" Brazil was by "killing thirty thousand people, beginning with Fernando Henrique Cardoso, the President of Brazil at that time.  These have encouraged right wing extremists to  demonstrate in front of the army headquarters calling for the return of military dictatorship and closure of the Congress and Supreme Court while President Bolsonaro, their patron smiles and cheers the crowds. Flavio Bolsonaro made a statement threatening that the supreme court could be closed just with a soldier and a corporal. In July 2019 a Brazilian Air Force Sergeant, on a special flight accompanying President Bolsonaro to a G20 meeting, tried to wheel a suitcase containing 39kg of cocaine through Spanish customs. He told officials who opened his suitcase that he was bringing cheese to a cousin. The Sergeant, Manoel Silva Rodrigues, had made 30 national and international trips for the Brazilian Air Force in five years. This is just an example of how the criminals are feeling free to commit crimes with impunity since the election of the extremist Bolsonaro. 

 

The security forces make money by selling weapons illegally to the criminals. Theft and “losses” of registered police, military and private security arms are routine. A 2011 state legislative enquiry into weapons found that 8,912 guns were “lost” or stolen from police stocks between 2000–2010. A follow-up enquiry in 2016 found that that 17.662 weapons (30 per cent of these companies’ total supply) were “lost” or stolen in the period 2005-15 from Rio’s private security firms most of which are owned by active and retired police and military personnel. 

 

The security forces conduct raids and make drug busts in the favelas in front of TV cameras basically as a show to divert attention and stigmatise the poor black residents of favelas. This is done to generate and sustain the atmosphere of fear and hate. The violence is used to generate insecurity which means money for the private security companies owned by high-ranking police and their political patrons. President Bolsonaro is openly encouraging the police to shoot first and ask questions later. He said criminals should “die in the streets like cockroaches”. He wants the killer cops to be decorated and not investigated for killing suspects. 

President Bolsonaro has loosened gun control to make more firearms available easily to more people. More guns mean more crime and more business for the militias which run protectionist rackets. Gun ownership rocketed by 98% during Bolsonaro’s first year as President. Sale of guns increased to 105,603 in the first eight months of 2020. This is more than the 94,000 sold in the whole year of 2019.  Weapons newly available to the public now include semi-automatic rifles, previously only available to the army. In April 2020, Bolsonaro revoked decrees that existed to facilitate the tracing and identification of weapons and ammunition. One week later, he tripled the quantity of ammunition available for purchase by civilians, saying on record in a ministerial meeting, that he wanted “everyone” to carry guns. His political philosophy, wrote Fernando de Barros e Silva, editor of the respected Piauí current affairs magazine, represented “the victory of the militia model of management of Brazilian violence”. 

Bolsonaro's signature favorite pose is shooting gesture with the thumb combined with the index and middle finger, mimicking a gun as in the picture below

This gun gesture has spread among his supporters across the country who show it in every pro-Bolsonaro street demonstration. During a campaign rally in the northwestern state of Acre, Bolsonaro picked up a tripod, put it on his chest to simulate a machine gun, and yelled: “let’s shoot this petralhada (a derogative nickname that the right wing created to their opponents, the workers’ party’s supporters) here in Acre!”

President Jair Bolsonaro has galvanized a new gun culture in Brazil. His three oldest  sons, politicians themselves, have been fierce proponents of expanding gun ownership through policy proposals and social media posts. Eduardo Bolsonaro has spoken admiringly of the Second Amendment in the United States. He has lobbied to make the Brazilian market more attractive to foreign arms manufacturers, which he says would lower prices and provide gun enthusiasts with more choices. Flávio Bolsonaro, a senator, made the promotion of gun manufacturing in Brazil the focus of his first project in the legislature last year. 

 

The rule of Bolsonaro and bullets condemns Brazil to suffer more violence and bloodshed in the coming years.