BRASILIA, Brazil — As the bus made its way from Brazil’s agricultural heartland to the capital, Andrea Barth pulled out her phone to ask her fellow passengers, one by one, what they planned to do once they arrived.
“Overthrow the thieves,” replied a man.
“Pull out ‘Nine Fingers,'” said another, referring to Brazil’s leftist president, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silvawho decades ago lost part of a finger in a factory accident.
As the passengers described their plans for violence, more than a hundred other buses were filled with supporters of Jair Bolsonarothe former far-right president, were also descending on Brasilia, the capital.
A day later, on January 8, a pro-Bolsonaro mob unleashed chaos that rocked the country and was broadcast around the world.
Rioters have invaded and looted Brazil’s Congress, Supreme Court and presidential offices, with the intention, according to many, of inciting military leaders to overthrow Lulawho had taken office a week earlier.
The assault showed that the far right is still at it serious threat.
Lula and the judicial authorities moved quickly to reassert control, detaining more than 1,150 rioters, clearing the camps housing them, hunting down their financiers and organizers and, on Friday, opening an investigation into how Bolsonaro may have inspired them.
The New York Times she spoke to law enforcement, government officials, eyewitnesses and protesters, and went through dozens of videos and hundreds of social media posts to piece together what happened.
The report shows that a mob rolled fast and effortlessly to a drastically outnumbered police presence.
It also shows that some officers not only failed to take action against the rioters, but also appeared to do so sympathize with them and snapped photos as the crowds went wild for Congress.
The imbalance between protesters and the police remains a focus of the authorities’ investigations, and talks with security officials have led to allegations of gross negligence and even active complicity in chaos.
As a result of the unrest, federal authorities suspended the governor in charge of building protection and arrested two senior security officials who worked for him.
While Brazilian institutions formed a united front against any attempt by Bolsonaro to challenge the election results – the former president fled to a rented house near Disney World – his false claims on electoral fraud has worsened and spread to the largest nation in Latin America.
The morning after the riots, interviews with a dozen protesters showed they were far from giving up and were even overtaking the man who had once led them.
“We are no longer here for President Bolsonaro. We are here for our nation, our freedom,” said Nathanael S. Viera, 51, who traveled 1,450 kilometers to fight what he called a communist plot.
“They’re stealing our future. Do you understand?”
On New Year’s Day, Lula walked up the ramp to the Brazilian presidential offices and accepted the green-and-gold presidential sash from a woman who collects trash for recycling.
Bolsonaro had already left for Florida.
Days later, in the pro-Bolsonaro corners of the Internet, a huge Sunday demonstration in the capital, exactly where a week earlier Lula’s supporters had celebrated.
“The plan is to surround Brasilia,” wrote one person in a Telegram group, attaching an aerial image of Congress, the Supreme Court and the Planalto Palace, seat of the presidency.
However, plans they didn’t seem too alarming to the authorities.
Ricardo Cappelli, the deputy official at Brazil’s justice ministry, said the pro-Bolsonaro demonstrations had long had a conspiratorial tone, but were largely non-violent.
The site of the planned protest — the mile-long grassy esplanade that ends at Brazil’s Congress — has been a favorite place for Brazilians to vent their frustration for decades, sometimes with crowds in the hundreds of thousands. .
Intelligence services suggested Sunday’s attendance would be a few thousand.
Although the esplanade is lined with the most important federal government buildings, another entity has long been responsible for security for demonstrations there: the district government which oversees Brasilia.
The federal government pays the district $2 billion annually to manage security and has been pleased with the results.
However, on January 2, the district’s security chief was replaced by Anderson Torres, Bolsonaro’s former justice minister and one of the main forces behind the unfounded claims that Brazil’s electronic voting systems are full of fraud.
Torres quickly replaced much of his department’s senior staff.
On Jan. 6, the district held a meeting that resulted in a four-page plan that assigns much of the responsibility for safety to the district police, according to a copy obtained by the Times.
Under the plan, police would stop the protesters before they reach Congress and study the possibility of closing the esplanade.
Flávio Dino, Brazil’s new justice minister, said the next day he was told by the district governor, Ibaneis Rocha, that the esplanade would remain off limits.
Then, just before the protest, Dino learned from a newspaper article that Rocha had decided to do it Open it to the protesters.
The number of policemen, Dino later told reporters, was sadly insufficient “to get them off the esplanade”.
Rocha said the size of the force was Torres’s responsibility.
On Saturday, Torres was in Florida starting a two-week vacation.
Sunday morning the atmosphere in the great avenues of Brasilia was eerily calm.
Ana Priscila Azevedo, 38, an aspiring right-wing online influencer, had been posting video after video before the attack.
In one of them it was said that Bolsonaro supporters intended to at least shut down eight refineries across the country to cut off the supply of petrol.
Sunday morning it was already on the esplanade. At 11:20am she posted a video assuring her followers that the stage was set for one of the most defining moments of their lives.
He had just spoken to two police officers, he said, and “they’re completely on our side.”
Bolsonaro supporters began to stream across the esplanade en masse.
As their numbers increased, they became more warlike, singing in unison:
“We will die for Brazil!”
Around noon, Rocha, the governor, received an audio message from an official who was replacing Torres, the head of security.
“Everything is calm,” the official said.
Then, at 2.42pm, a wave of protesters reached one of the barricades.
A group of protesters stood back on the metal railing, while another group crossed the barricade.
Some police officers sprayed a chemical agent, but resistance was minimal.
Within seconds, the security line was down.
The invasion had begun.
A wave of bodies rushed towards Congress.
Many protesters ran directly to the wide ramp leading to the roof of the Capitol.
As a crowd rampaged through the Capitol, another group headed about 1,000 feet toward the Planalto, while a third headed 1,000 feet in the opposite direction, toward the Supreme Court.
They easily broke into both.
At 3.45 pm the Planalto ramp was full of rioters.
The government estimates there were about 5,000 protesters, said Cappelli, a justice ministry official, while the district later reported it had assigned 1,300 police officers to the event.
However, Cappelli believes there were “far fewer” than 1,300 officers present, and footage throughout the day shows that they were vastly outnumbered.
“The question is not only the number, if the orientation is:
‘Stay there’ or ‘Stay out,'” he said. “It’s the order.”
The same forces had helped protect the inauguration and other protests, he added.
What had changed was his new boss: Torres, a Bolsonaro ally.
Rocha also blamed Torres and his team.
“The governor has been deceived,” said Alberto Toron, Rocha’s attorney.
At 4:43 pm, Rocha fired Torres, six days after taking office.
Around 6 pm Lula issued an emergency decree. Cappelli was named the district’s new security chief and took to the streets, in a suit and tie, to lead the forces.
By then, Army soldiers, federal police, and other reinforcements had already arrived and were retaking the buildings.
Authorities arrested 210 people at the place of events.
That night, the Supreme Court suspended Rocha for 90 days.
The court later approved a federal police request for arrest warrants against Torres and the district police chief.
On Saturday, Torres was arrested upon arriving in Brasilia from Florida.
During a search of his home, the authorities found a draft presidential decree that he was intended for cancel the election.
Torres suggested that he received the document from a third party and planned to throw it away.
The morning after the riots, authorities evacuated a long-standing protest camp across from army headquarters, holding 1,200 people.
c.2023 The New York Times Society
Source: Clarin
Mark Jones is a world traveler and journalist for News Rebeat. With a curious mind and a love of adventure, Mark brings a unique perspective to the latest global events and provides in-depth and thought-provoking coverage of the world at large.