A prison police sympathizer of the Brazilian president, Jair Bolsonaro, shot dead a militant of former president Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva during his birthday partyin the city of Foz de Iguaçu, official sources reported this Sunday.
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The events occurred last morning, when the federal agent broke into the celebration and opened fire on Marcelo Arruda, who was a municipal guard and one of the leaders of the Workers’ Party (PT) in Foz de Iguaçu.
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Minutes later he returned to the premises and that was when he attacked Arruda, who managed to react from the ground and shot his assailant, who fell to the ground.
The Civil Police of the state of Paraná reported in a first statement that the aggressor had died from Arruda’s shots, although, hours later, they corrected that information and said that he was admitted to a hospital “in serious condition.”
Arruda, who became a candidate for vice mayor in that Brazilian border town in the 2020 municipal elections, commemorated his 50th birthday with a theme party about Lula and the PT.
The aggressor, identified as Jose da Rocha Guaranho, went to the place of the celebration for the first time, at the headquarters of the Physical Health Sports Association of Itaipu, threatened everyone present “with a weapon in his hand” and left.
Minutes later he returned to the premises and that was when he attacked Arruda, who managed to react from the ground and shot his assailant, who fell to the ground, according to security camera images leaked by the press.
The commissioner in charge of the case, Iane Cardoso, stated in a press conference that Witnesses stated that Da Rocha Guaranho issued proclamations in favor of Bolsonaro, leader of the Brazilian extreme rightand that everything indicates that it was a “political conflict”.
Arruda’s murder occurs 84 days before the polarized Brazilian presidential elections, for which the clear favorite is Lula, with an advantage of between 15 and 20 points over Bolsonaro, according to the latest polls.
condemnation in the world of politics
The event was widely condemned by authorities, presidential candidates, political parties and civil society organizations.
Lula, who governed Brazil between 2003 and 2010, attributed the incident to “hate speech stimulated by an irresponsible president”, alluding to Bolsonaro, and stated that Brazil needs “democracy, dialogue, tolerance and peace”.
For his part, Bolsonaro retrieved a message he published in 2018 — the year he was stabbed during a campaign rally — in which he rejected “those who practice violence against opponents,” but at the same time accused the left of having ” an undeniable history of violent episodes” and to “decontextualize” his words.
The president of the PT, deputy Gleisi Hoffmann, asked the country’s public security authorities for “effective measures to prevent and combat political violence.”
In the last month there have been a couple of incidents at PT events with the presence of Lula.
In one of them, a suspect launched two firecrackers and in another a drone threw sewer water against the PT militancy. In both cases the authors are detained.
On the other hand, the Labor presidential candidate Ciro Gomes, third in voting intentions, stated that “political hatred needs to be contained” to prevent “a tragedy of gigantic proportions” from occurring in the midst of this “absurd, senseless war and purposeless.”
Our companheiro Marcelo Arruda commemorated his 50th anniversary with family and friends, in peace, in Foz do Iguaçu. Affiliated to the Partido dos Trabalhadores, their party has a theme or PT is hopeful for the future; With the joy of a country that I just had more than one file.
– Lula (@LulaOficial) July 10, 2022
The president of the Senate, Rodrigo Pacheco, indicated that Arruda’s death is “the materialization of the political intolerance that permeates today’s Brazil” and shows “what it is like to live in barbarism.”
“We must all, especially political leaders, fight to combat this hatred, which goes against the basic principles of family life, in society and in democracy,” he added.
Supreme Court Judge Alexandre de Moraes also spoke, stressing that “intolerance, violence and hatred are enemies of democracy and development”; and recalled that “respect for free choice must be defended by all the authorities of the three powers.”
Civil society also joined the condemnations, such as the Political Action Network for Sustainability (RAPS), which repudiated “the escalation of political violence in Brazil” and alerted democratic institutions about “the need to expand dialogue actions civic” in the country.
“Political violence can no longer be tolerated,” said this non-governmental organization made up of 750 members of 29 political parties in the country.
INTERNATIONAL WRITING
*With information from EFE
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