BRASILIA, (Reuters) – Brazil’s next justice minister yesterday vowed accountability for supporters of far-right President Jair Bolsonaro who burned buses and attacked police on the day authorities certified the victory of leftist President-elect Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva.
Flavio Dino also told GloboNews that any authorities found responsible for failing to contain rioters in Brasilia on Monday night would also face punishment, with no “magic amnesty,” as questions mounted about the official response to the violent protests.
Senior members of Brazil’s Supreme Court (STF) and Federal Electoral Court (TSE) believe Brasilia’s security forces were too lenient and should have acted more forcefully, two court sources told Reuters, in the latest example of tensions between the judiciary and the federal district’s law enforcement.
In an interview late on Monday, Brasilia security chief Júlio Danilo denied security failures, saying that those involved will be identified and held accountable.
Monday’s protests in the capital, in which Bolsonaro supporters set fire to cars and buses after trying to invade the federal police headquarters after the arrest of a protest leader, capped weeks of post-election tensions.
Although he has not blocked the handover of power, Bolsonaro has refused to concede defeat, and some supporters have camped outside army bases urging the military to overturn the result of October’s presidential vote, citing conspiracy theories that the election was “stolen.”
Dino said he hoped the protesters would now see the futility of their actions, and urged them to return to their homes.
“It’s over, the page has been turned, let’s look ahead. In 2026, there will be fresh elections,” he said.
Yet that may be optimistic, public security experts told Reuters, with even the short-term outlook appearing complicated. “The problem is, we don’t know if this was a warning of what is still to come, or if they emptied the chamber already,” said João Roberto Martins Filho, an expert on military relations at the Federal University of São Carlos, in reference to Lula’s Jan. 1 inauguration.
In his interview with GloboNews, Dino said he maintained regular contact with Brasilia’s Governor Ibaneis Rocha, as well as its public security department, over policing arrangements for Lula’s inauguration. But he noted a “strange silence” from federal authorities, in a thinly veiled dig at Bolsonaro’s team.
The president has barely spoken in public since losing to Lula on Oct. 30, and the only comment from his government on Monday came from Justice Minister Anderson Torres.
“Nothing justifies the lamentable scenes we saw in the center of Brasilia,” he wrote in a tweet.
Opposition lawmakers questioned why there were no arrests of the rioters by Brasilia’s security forces.
“I think it’s time to think about more rigorously interpreting the leniency of current government officials, who are irresponsibly and permissively indulging these criminal practices,” said Fábio Trad, a federal lawmaker on Lula’s transition team.
Brasilia’s public security department said in a statement on Tuesday that the riots had been controlled, but no arrests related to “civil disturbances” had occurred.
Within the STF and the TSE, Monday’s riots add to growing discontent with Brasilia’s security forces for failing to get tough with Bolsonaro supporters who view the justices as their principal foes, said the two sources on condition of anonymity.
Last year, one of the sources said, the Supreme Court asked Governor Rocha to provide more security for court employees to protect them from Bolsonaro supporters approaching the tribunal. It was not clear if it was provided. Both sources said they believed it was time to disband the protest camp established outside the military headquarters in Brasilia.
The justice ministry did not respond to a request for comment on whether such a plan was underway.