Three episodes left the week with a bitter taste and caused outrage. The 1 million euro bail that removed Daniel Alves from prison, a man convicted of rape; the suffering and lonely crying of Real Madrid player Vini Jr., when talking about the racist persecution he suffers in Spain; and finally, the circumstances highlighted by the Federal Police to indicate those who ordered the murder of Marielle Franco.
The first two cases took place in Spain, a country that has not always managed to show a very friendly face to Brazilians. This week, the message that came from there was racism, once again, and shameful judicial leniency when pricing rape. A slap in the face to women and anyone who values basic civilizing principles. It is unacceptable to set a million-dollar bail for a millionaire criminal to get out of jail.
The insistence with which some Spaniards repeat that Spain is “not racist” clashes with reality. One gets the impression, I could be wrong, that an idealized and condescending image of the country prevails in these cases, a way of being denialist in the face of facts. If it is not racist, it is necessary to recognize that racism manifests itself persistently and loudly in sectors of the population. Europe, no matter how enlightened it may be, is a continent with a long history of racism and xenophobia.
In Brazil this type of self-deception also exists. Jair Bolsonaro's shady government officially considered that there was no racism here — and there are those who continue to think so.
As for the murder of Marielle Franco, attention was drawn to the immense cruelty and cynical refinement of suspects, such as Rivaldo Barbosa, then head of the Civil Police, and police chief Giniton Lages. Both, who would have participated in the criminal plot, showed solidarity with the victim's family – with the right, in the case of the second, to release a book about the councilor.
The outcry surrounding the lack of institutional control in Rio de Janeiro is obviously well-founded, but the problem is old and does not just concern the situation in Rio de Janeiro. The signs emphatically suggest that the dominance of drug trafficking, organized crime and militias over the political and institutional world is broad and deep. The interests of criminal organizations are widespread across institutions and powers.
The Amazon case is extremely serious. The control of shipping routes for billions of dollars in cocaine is associated with illegal mining and land grabbing. Factions formed in Brazilian prisons became multinational crime companies.
While some pose as indignant with Rio (which really deserves indignation), it is good to remember that the capital of São Paulo is the birthplace of the PCC, a criminal giant that spreads tentacles across Brazilian territory and beyond our borders. Recently, in fact, former lieutenant colonel José Afonso Adriano, seen as head of a vast corruption scheme in the São Paulo PM, stated that all units of the corporation would have parallel funds to divert public resources.
If in Rio or Bahia the picture of violence and abuse is obvious, it is a mistake not to consider that we are facing a plague on a national scale.
The drama is that there is no solution in sight. Measures such as the legalization of gambling and soft drugs and the reform of the police in a scope that encompasses federal responsibility seem far off the horizon.
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