Police formally accuse Bolsonaro, two generals and 34 others of attempted coup in Brazil

This Thursday, the Brazilian Federal Police formally accused former president Jair Bolsonaro, 69, a retired far-right military officer, of attempting to carry out a coup d’état, as reported by the corporation in a statement. The ultra tried to ignore the result of the elections and prevent the leftist Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva from returning to power. Along with the man who governed Brazil between 2019 and 2022, 36 other people are accused, including two reserve generals who were ministers of his Government. The police report has been submitted to the Supreme Court. Bolsonaro is already subject to precautionary measures in this case. He is prohibited from traveling abroad and, therefore, his passport was withdrawn months ago. The former president has referred to the accusation on X, the old Twitter: “I have to see what is in that accusation from the PF (Federal Police). “I’m going to wait for the lawyer (…) I can’t expect anything from a team that uses creativity to report me.”

The police report that their charge sheet is based on evidence obtained in these two years through “police investigations, the lifting of secrecy on telematic and telephone communications, banking information, prosecutors, award-winning collaborations (with informers), records, and seizures, other measures duly authorized by the Judiciary,” the note adds.

The formal police accusation has already been sent to the Supreme Court, which must forward it to the State Attorney General’s Office. This will decide whether to formalize the complaint against the former president, file it or request new proceedings. The 37 suspects are accused of violent abolition of the democratic rule of law, coup d’état and membership in a criminal organization.

Bolsonaro, nostalgic for the dictatorship, was already disqualified by judges months ago from running in the elections until 2030. In that case, he was convicted of abuse of power, for taking advantage of the presidential position to systematically question the security of the system of vote.

Investigators maintain that the coup was not carried out because the coup plotters did not obtain the support of the then commanders of the Army and Air Force, Generals Marco Antonio Freire Gomes and Carlos de Almeida Baptista. Both implicated the former president in the plot by appearing as witnesses in the case, as was learned in March. They said that the then head of state called them to meetings at his residence in the Alvorada palace, in Brasilia, where he showed them a draft of the document to declare a state of siege, as the first move to prevent Lula from assuming power. Instead, the then commander of the Navy, Admiral Almir Garnier, joined the coup plotters and offered his sailors for the riot.

Among those accused in the plot are two retired army generals who were ministers and were among Bolsonaro’s closest collaborators during his mandate. Walter Braga Netto was Minister of the Presidency, Defense and candidate for vice president in the elections that Lula won in 2022. Augusto Heleno was Minister of Institutional Security, in charge of protecting the Presidency.

The formal accusation is known after the police revealed this week that, as part of the plot, the coup plotters planned to kill Lula when he was president-elect and other authorities with a plan that was designed by the number two of the Ministry of the Presidency and printed in the palace where the leaders office. Furthermore, last week a Bolsonaro sympathizer blew himself up in front of the highest court building.

Gleisi Hoffmann, the president of Lula’s Workers’ Party, considers that it is time for Bolsonaro to go to prison after he “and his gang (…) tried to commit electoral fraud, assassinate authorities and install a dictatorship” . Before the accusation against his predecessor became known, President Lula referred to the plan to kill him: “The attempt to assassinate us did not go well, here we are.” The leftist has also taken the opportunity to emphasize that he “does not persecute anyone.”

For analyst Eduardo Heleno, professor at the Institute of Strategic Studies of the Fluminense Federal University (no relation to the accused Augusto Heleno), the formal accusation “makes clear how the Armed Forces were politicized and instrumentalized to fulfill Bolsonaro’s power project and his circle of trust.” The specialist adds that, “for the part of the military leadership that rejected the coup call, it allows us to separate the wheat from the chaff, without a doubt, and reaffirms the commitment to the oath to protect the institutions (…) However, the reactionary values ​​of the Bolsonarism is still rooted in the culture of many Brazilian soldiers.”

Throughout his mandate, Bolsonaro embraced a discourse that flirted time and again with the threat of democratic breakdown. In an official act, he even proclaimed that he would disobey Supreme Court Judge Alexandre de Moraes, in addition to insulting him, and, in October 2023, he refused to recognize Lula’s electoral victory, in the closest elections in the history of Brazil. The next day, tens of thousands of Bolsonaro supporters camped outside barracks throughout the country demanding military intervention.

It was during the two months of the transition period when, according to the official police accusation, meetings, messages and movements multiplied to stage a coup so that Lula would no longer govern the country.

Thousands of Bolsonaro supporters staged a coup attack in Brasilia on January 8, 2023, a week after Lula took office for a third non-consecutive term. Until now, only some of the material authors of that attack have been tried and convicted. The Supreme Court has imposed harsh sentences on more than 200 people, but none of those accused of instigating or financing the coup attempt has been in the dock for the moment.

Bolsonaro’s personal secretary, the soldier who carried his cell phone while he was president and accompanied him at all events, Mauro Cid, is a key piece of the police investigation against the previous president and the rest of the suspects of participating in the plot. coup plotter After a few months in preventive detention in a military prison, he agreed to collaborate with the police and detail the coup attempt.