Federal Investigation of the Massacres in Favelas Penha and Alemão Now!

On October 28th, the Rio de Janeiro State Government shocked the country with the deadliest operation in our history: 121 dead, according to the police, including four police officers and 117 suspects. In the Penha and Alemão complexes [favelas], bodies were found in the woods, showing signs of torture or execution in a position of surrender. Structured to execute 100 arrest warrants, the operation was effective in 20 of them. Prepared over nine months, the operation premeditated the deaths rather than the arrests. Lula finally said what he should have said, rightly so: “The judge’s decision was an arrest warrant, not a kill order. And there was killing.”

The action was considered “a success” by Governor Cláudio Castro, but he prevented the Rio Public Defender Office from participating in the process of identifying the bodies, as established by ADPF Favelas (Arguição de Descumprimento de Preceito Fundamental, an action filed with the STF with the aim of preventing or repairing damage to a precept of the Federal Constitution caused by an act of the Public Power).

The governor’s attitude reveals that, as in so many other cases, the intention is to hide the violence of this operation from the law, ensuring impunity for barbarism. And in the favelas, life continues in precarious conditions, with a lack of public services for the population, who end up subject to the “services” of criminality in order to have access to basic rights such as electricity, gas, and the internet, for example.

A blood-soaked platform, a so-called Peace Consortium, was formed in 24 hours: governors from Minas Gerais, Santa Catarina, Mato Grosso do Sul, Goiás, the Federal District, and São Paulo (via video) joined together in support of Governor Castro. In the strategy of Castro, who is a candidate for the Senate, the regrouping of the right wing emerges to rescue the audience.

The goal of the hysteria of right-wing and far-right congressmen against alleged “narco-terrorism,” mimicking Trump, is clear: to involve the US authorities, once again putting our sovereignty in check. At the federal level, we saw them appropriating the issue and trying to change the national agenda to reverse President Lula’s growing popularity. From various angles, the press was servile to them.

The fight against crime must take place within the legal framework. So far, right-wing and centrist lawmakers have not allowed the Public Security Constitutional Amendment Proposal to be voted on, guided by and in collusion with governors who fear losing their “schemes” that feed the drains of corruption that do explain why they have so much money, since with the greater federal presence in the investigations of factions that the proposed amendment provides for, these schemes could be uncovered.

Lawmakers prefer spectacular Parliamentary Inquiry Commissions, while what is needed is to ensure attention to favela residents by providing public services and full protection from the State.

Carrying out a court order is not pulling the trigger. That is the death penalty, and its investigation cannot be carried out by the peers of its executor. After all, there are no legal proceedings in 99% of cases of murders committed by the state, and none of the recent massacres, such as those in Cabula (State of Bahia), Guarujá (State of São Paulo), and Jacarezinho (State of Rio Janeiro).

Operation Containment premeditated the executions. The execution of councilwoman Marielle Franco was also premeditated. It was the federalization of the case that allowed the Federal Police to reach the criminals and those who ordered the killings.

Lula spoke of an “independent investigation” and the “possibility of federal experts monitoring it.” The necessary response from the federal government is the immediate federalization of the investigation of this and other massacres, guaranteeing reparations for the victims. DAP supports and calls on the entire party and society to support the Campaign for the Federalization of the Investigation of Massacres.