MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency
Bolsonaro celebrates crime index falls to its lowest level in more than a decade
“IN OUR GOVERNMENT HOMICIDES, VIOLENCE AND FALLACIES FALL!” an exultant Bolsonaro wrote on his Twitter account Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro celebrated Friday after a crime index showed homicides fell to their lowest level in more than a decade during the first year of his term.
Brazil had 41,635 killings in 2019, down 19% from the prior year and the least number of homicides since 2007, when the so-called Violence Monitor index was launched. It is a partnership between the non-profit Brazilian Forum of Public Security, the University of Sao Paulo’s Center for the Study of Violence, and news website G1, which published the data Friday.
“IN OUR GOVERNMENT HOMICIDES, VIOLENCE AND FALLACIES FALL!” an exultant Bolsonaro wrote on his Twitter account, sharing the G1 news report. “Our government extends a strong embrace to all the security agents of the country. Brazil continues on the right path.”
Bolsonaro made fighting crime and violence one of his signature campaign issues that ultimately swept him to the presidency in a country where people had grown weary of growing insecurity. He has deployed rhetoric that encourages violence against crime, including saying police officers who kill should be awarded medals rather than slapped with lawsuits.
In 2016, the most deadly year in the Violence Monitor’s records, Brazil had nearly 60,000 homicides.
Robert Muggah, co-founder of security think-tank Igarapé Institute, said the fall in homicides was indeed “stunning,” but questioned the government’s claim about its cause.
He said crimes began to fall early in 2018, before Bolsonaro won the presidential election, and noted that the leader signed an anti-crime bill to tackle violence just at the end of 2019.
“Although Bolsonaro and his supporters have sought to own recent improvements in public security, there are other factors at play that have little to do with their efforts,” Muggah said.
He and other security experts don’t agree that more aggressive policing is responsible for better security indicators. They have offered other theories for the national improvement: individual states adopting new security policies, easing conflict between rival drug factions, demographic shifts, the transfer of gang members to federal prisons, stronger economic activity, and even proliferation of smart phones keeping young people off the streets.
Muggah said the various factors have influenced events in different degrees, but the impact of each is not clear.
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Read all commentsBolsonaro's opponents and the international news media hate him just like Trump, but this is a major victory for the Brazilian people.
Feb 16th, 2020 - 02:34 pm 0Brasil acima de tudo, Deus acima de todos.
”Last Monday (16), the Estado de S. Paulo newspaper published an interview with Supreme Court Chief Justice Dias Toffoli, which deserves to be read by everyone.
Feb 17th, 2020 - 01:48 am 0The headline reads: “Toffoli says Lava Jato destroyed businesses and the Public Prosecutors Office didn’t act transparently.” In other words, the Chief Justice admited what we have been saying for a long time.
The Lava Jato investigation was not effectively created to fight corruption – it was created to implement a policy based on the interests of international capital in Brazil, especially US interests.
The Lava Jato investigation had two primary goals. The first was to criminalize the political opposition and make it impossible for the left to continue governing Brazil. The second was to destroy strategic Brazilian companies and economic sectors such as oil and gas. But they did not only destroy Petrobras. Lava Jato also destroyed Brazil’s most important construction and engineering businesses, which were operating worldwide.
This is exactly what Chief Justice Dias Toffoli says in his interview. What happened in Brazil would have never happened in the United States or Germany. There, entrepreneurs are punished, but companies aren’t normally punished. The State will subsidize and even even nationalize private companies to prevent them from folding.
http://www.brasilwire.com/chief-justice-toffoli-says-lava-jato-tried-to-destroy-brazil/
Excellent example why Bolsonaro was elected to clean out the systemic PT corruption of the past!
Feb 17th, 2020 - 02:14 pm 0Brasil acima de tudo, Deus acima de todos.
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