MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

Brazilian Catholic bishops join anit-corrution protests and call for ‘deep reforms’

Demonstrators march along the streets of Rio with brooms and placards

Brazilian Catholic bishops called for “a profound political reform” against corruption and strongly supported the popular protests that have erupted in the country following the disclosure of several scandals that have swept away four ministers and has reached the doorsteps of Congress.

“We feel great concern not only because of corruption, but rather because of impunity” said the chair of Brazil’s Conference of Bishops, CNNB, Leonardo Steiner.

The bishops who addressed the issue during a meeting in Brasilia released a communiqué in which they call on Congress to implement a “profound political reform” which eliminates secret balloting of lawmakers and “extirps old damaging practices for the improvement of democracy”.

One of the cases which triggered most uproar was a secret ballot in Congress that which allowed a woman lawmaker to avoid the loss of her bench in spite of videos showing her receiving money from another politician accused of corruption.

“The question I ask myself, not as CNNB, but as a simple citizen is if Congress is legitimate to address such a political reform or should we have a constitutional assembly to make that reform which is so necessary”, said Steiner.

Likewise the bishops express their strong support to the public demonstrations and marches, launched 7 September (Independence Day) in Brasilia and which this week were repeated in Rio do Janeiro, all of them convened through the social networks with no intervention of political parties.

Protests target the deviation of government funds and other corruption modalities.

“We help promote” the demonstrations so that “they can demand Congress a really in depth authentic political reform that ensures the institutions of the country”, added Bishop Steiner.

This week Brazilians held anti-corruption protests for two days running waving brooms as they called for a clean-up of public life.

Over 2.000 people with the national colours (yellow and green) took to the streets of Rio de Janeiro.

The demonstrators, part of a growing national anti-corruption movement in Brazil, carried placards that read “Down With Corruption” and “Impunity is the only sure thing that you get with corrupt politicians”.