Law and Order

It was a big week for important events in law and justice in Brazil, and the forces of the old and new Brazil were at play.

First, the House of Representatives passed the new Código Florestal, or Forest Code, which eases rules for small scale farmers in the Amazon and could potentially lead to further deforestation and expanded powers for agricultural interests in the Amazon. In addition, it grants amnesty for all farmers and ranchers who illegally deforested more land than allowed by the original law prior to July 2008, which would save them from expensive fines. The law still has to pass the Senate and President Dilma's approval (she has said she will veto the amnesty portion), but it looks possible. Meanwhile, recent reports show a spike in Amazon deforestation over the past year, increasing 26 percent from August 2010 to April 2011. Izabella Teixeira, the environmental minister, called a "crisis cabinet" in the midst of the Código Florestal debate. This year, Ibama doubled its police operations to try to combat illegal deforestation, but some suspect ranchers are anticipating a change in the forest code that will allow them immunity.

While Congress indicated its willingness to cede more power to powerful business interests in the Amazon, a terrible tragedy occured in Pará, the heart of the environmental debate in Brazil. Environmental activist José Cláudio Ribeiro da Silva and his wife were brutally murdered by gunmen, after constant threats from local loggers and ranchers.

Here's Zé speaking at TEDx last year:

 

President Dilma has called for a federal investigation into the murders, which are unfortunately not uncommon in Pará.

But trouble was brewing at the Palácio do Planalto this week. Dilma's chief of staff, Antonio Palocci, is now the center of a corruption scandal, as he was accused of increasing his wealth by 20 times while he worked simultaneously as a business consultant and a federal deputy between 2007 and 2010. Dilma has defended Palocci, and he is claiming that the accusations are false, merely a political ploy by the opposition. Given Palocci's position as a power broker and his proximity to the president, the incident has Brasília's bigwigs scrambling either in Palocci's defense or demanding his head.

Then, over to the Supreme Court, where justices announced that they would reopen the case on accused Italian fugitive Cesare Battisti, who is still in Brazil after President Lula granted him amnesty in a literal last minute decision before leaving office. On June 1st, the court will decide if Battisti will, in the end, be extradited or remain in Brazil.

Also this week, the Supreme Court rejected the appeal of journalist Pimenta Neves and ordered his arrest, 11 years after he murdered his girlfriend. Neves admitted to the shooting in 2000, and was tried by a jury and found guilty of murder in 2006, condemned to 19 years in prison. However, he was only in prison immediately following the murder for less than 7 months, and has remained free as he put his appeals all the way through to the STF, which allowed him to stay out of jail during the appeals process. In the most recent decision, his sentence was reduced to 15 years, but the court ordered his immediate imprisonment. The ever-wonderful Minister Ellen Gracie was key to the decision, who said the case is a constant embarrassment in international meetings, claiming it was impossible to justify Neves' impunity. The press has followed Neves'every move since his transfer to a white collar prison in São Paulo, where many other high profile criminals have been or are currently behind bars.

Comments

[RFS]

Gringa,

You always try so hard to fit your stories in recognizable pattern. That's why I'm always disputing your line of thought.

In this case, your effort in stereotyping the story about the Forest Code, in making it fit a "recognizable pattern" - saying that this is just another case of the government watering down restrictions on the activities of powerful businesses at the expense of the natives, the kind of story about which Hollywood has probably produced a multitude of movies -; this makes you contradict yourself: for as you yourself wrote, the Code's reforms benefit mainly small farmers.

It must be remembered that the new Forest Code's main sponsor is Rep. (or is it Senator? I'm not sure) Aldo Rebelo, a member of the Partido Comunista do Brasil: not one of the main recipients of large businesses' donations.

[Rio Gringa]

Hi RFS,

Any new law that legalizes more deforestation will ultimately benefit big agro interests. They already pretty much ignore the laws and this will likely give them even more confidence to continue. Plus, the caveat about amnesty indicates to me that lawmakers would precisely want people to believe that the new code would benefit "the little guy" by presenting it as a socialist or socially beneficial law, but while combining several elements into a single law, they really slipped in parts that are actually meant to protect business interests. (On a separate note, this happens in US lawmaking all the time, too.) Ibama is already struggling as it is, and any legislation that loosens rather than restricts anything to do with land development in the Amazon is going to make it even harder for them. I do hope Dilma nixed the piece about amnesty for previous violators, but it still seems quite clear to me that the only way this would get enough support to pass is that there are much bigger interests at play.

Nevertheless, I do very much enjoy your intellectual challenges. It keeps me on my toes :)

[Eric]

My best friends are big farmers and surprisingly they told me they are against any law to increase deforestation areas. They say there are too much farmland in Brazil already. According to them, those Amazon farmers are "dinosaurs", second class farmers, still living in the "Era dos Coronéis", or the kind of farmer who would kill MST members and make them receive more money to their "fight against the big farmers". Modern farmers, producing outside forests areas, don´t need to go that far. They are more worried about transport structure(logistics) and credit. PT party did that to gain small land owners support, but ultimately this will also keep the "dinosaurs alive and shotting" and the MST will keep receiving "donations" from all Brazilians citizens pockets.

Now Palloci, well, like senator Sarney said, every former politician traffic "information"(actually is more like "influence", but Sarney probably thought this word was too strong) and we should not blame the traffickers or the buyers, we should blame ourselves for not having enough money to buy that "information". Sarney already explained that...

[Ian Nieves]

I suspect Amazon deforestation may be an issue that's not neatly divided along ideological or social lines. Many rich "dinosaur" ranchers profit by leveling more rain forest to extend their cattle pastures or farmland; so do many impoverished small plot holders. Corporate interests champion the former; O Partido Communista and other leftists support the latter. Similarly, other Big Farmer interests and populists oppose Amazon decimation for reasons both ecological and financial. The big winners are the politicians, who can be assured of broad-based support regardless of stance.