The bill approved by the Congress allows for social protests to be considered and judged as terrorism.
By Bernardo Cerdeira
Last Monday, March 24th, the Chamber of Deputies approved the Law Project 2016/2015 called Anti – Terrorism Act. This law project came from the Executive and the deputy José Guimarães (PT-Ceará), lead of the government’s bloc, was the one to defend it.
According to the text finally approved, terrorism is defined as the practice, by one or more people, of sabotage, violence, or potentially violent acts, “when committed with the goal of causing social or generalized terror, exposing people, public patrimony or authority to danger”.
The classification is deliberately vague, allowing for damages to patrimony, apology to terrorism or supposedly preparatory acts, social protests for example, to be considered and penalized as terrorism. However, if the definitions to categorize terrorism are vague, the punishment is very clear instead: it goes from 12 to 30 years in prison.
Vague definitions will allow for police agents, prosecutors and judges to consider and judge as “terrorism” any confrontation originated in social protests. It is worth to remember that even before the existence of this law, the homeless Rafael Vieira was condemned to five years of prison for having a bottle of disinfectant and another one of chlorine bleach near a protest in Rio de Janeiro on June 2013; a protest he was not even participating of.
The goal of this bill is very clear: to preventively put in hands of the State a weapon to smash and repress popular revolts, or simply criminalize social movements. In other words: a weapon in hands of the exploiting classes to suffocate the struggle of the oppressed ones in defense of their rights. It is not by chance this law was firstly proposed after the protests of June 2013.
What is most scandalous about this is, this weapon was elaborated in the offices of the Planalto Palace, in Brasilia, and it was presented and defended in the Congress by the government, headed by the PT. Ironically, some PT’s leaders who were arrested and tortured, like president Dilma herself, are the ones to present a bill with the same arguments of the famous “National Security Act”, which was the base to repress political and social movements back on military dictatorship times.
Understanding the law
Vague definition: the Law Project 2016/ 2015, called Anti – Terrorism Act, allows for damages to patrimony, apology to terrorism or supposedly preparatory acts of protest or manifestation to be considered and penalized as terrorism. Such vague definitions will allow for police agents, prosecutors and judges to consider and judge as “terrorism” any confrontation that may occur in social demonstrations.
Punishment: if the definitions to categorize terrorism are vague, the punishment is very clear instead: it goes from 12 to 30 years in prison.
Goal: Fearing social explosion, the bill aims to preventively put in hands of the State a weapon to smash and repress popular revolts, or simply criminalize social movements.
Fear of social explosions: PT’s government answers the call of imperialism
Anti – terrorist laws are no news. Although only 18 countries adopted this type of legislation, (Brazil is the 19th), it has been the United States and European Union guideline for countries where there have been social explosions of resistance to the so called ‘austerity plans’.
Under the justification of fighting terrorism, these laws seek to legalize the action of repressive entities of the bourgeois State against the massive resistance of population to the attacks they suffer to their rights.
At the same time, they seek to criminalize social movements opposing those attacks. It was not different in Brazil. Pressure came from the Group of Financial Action Against Money Laundering and Terrorism Financing (GAFI), an intergovernmental organization pushed by imperialist countries. This entity required Brazil to adopt laws with specific punishment for terrorism, using the proximity of Olympic Games, in Rio de Janeiro, as an excuse. Fearing a growing social mobilization, Dilma’s government accepted the requirements of imperialism and the most reactionary sectors of the National Congress, and allied with them to approve this act.
PT’s botch: against the people, in favor of State Repression
After Dilma’s government launched the Law Project and the Chamber approved it, PT made a maneuver to take their responsibility for a heavily repressive act: PT’s leadership guided Dilma to veto the project presented by the Executive!
The stunt is rude: with the government’s hand, PT presents a law to facilitate State repression. With the party’s hand, PT guides Dilma to veto the law, which actually will not happen: it is an attempt to confuse people and to get free of responsibility for its authorship and defense.
Actually, PT follows the logic that guides its entire national and international policy: to govern in alliance with bourgeoisie, accepting international orders of imperialism, and fully defending the bases of national and international capitalism.
This logic implies to strengthen the bases of the bourgeois state, which sustains the capitalist order and, consequently, its repressive organs: the police, the Army and the political repressive entities.
The Anti – Terrorism Act only legalizes an existing repression. MTST, represented by its coordinator Guilherme Boulos, asked Dilma to veto three specific points of the bill. This means to accept the law without denouncing the government who proposed it. It is necessary to organize the struggle for the full annulment of the Anti – Terrorism Act, demanding for all social movements organizations and parties which call themselves “left – wing”, to repudiate this initiative of the government and the National Congress, and to join the struggle to take it down. Nothing less.
**
Translation: Mariana Soléo.
Originally published in Opinião Socialista nº512, March 2016
