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Right-wing candidate woos Brazil voters with guns 'to end violence'

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Agence France-Presse

<div class="embed-wrap"><figure data-feedback="fb:likes,fb:comments"><img src="http://sa.kapamilya.com/absnews/abscbnnews/media/2018/overseas/10/10/20181009-jair-bolsonaro-rtr.jpg"/><figcaption>Jair Bolsonaro, far-right lawmaker and presidential candidate of the Social Liberal Party (PSL). Ricardo Moraes, Reuters/file</figcaption></figure></div>Jair Bolsonaro topped the poll in the first round of Brazil&#x27;s presidential elections, having seduced tens of millions of voters with simple -- though radical -- solutions to eradicating violence in one of the world&#x27;s deadliest countries.For many, Bolsonaro has the answer to the question that has preoccupied them for years -- how to lower the crime rate in a country with more than seven murders an hour?&quot;Give guns to good people,&quot; the former paratrooper insisted during campaign meetings.&quot;If one of us, a civilian or a soldier, is attacked... and if he fires 20 times at the assailant, he should be decorated and not have to go to court,&quot; the far-right candidate told a campaign meeting in the northern Rio neighborhood of Madureira in August.It was a simple speech that hit the mark for Jamaya Beatriz, a manicurist from this violent suburb of Rio De Janeiro.&quot;I live in a dangerous neighborhood,&quot; the young woman said. &quot;If someone breaks into my home, I want to be able to defend my children.&quot;<div>- Hate crimes -</div>Sara Winter, a right-wing candidate for the National Assembly, finds it positive that Bolsonaro wants to arm women &quot;so they can defend themselves, increase penalties for rapists and introduce chemical castration.&quot;Bolsonaro himself became a victim of violence during the campaign, when he was stabbed by a leftist sympathizer on September 6 and had to spend the last several weeks convalescing in hospital.Just before the attack, he had called for &quot;shooting&quot; members of the Workers Party in the state in which he was campaigning.Brazil is awash with weapons. Not only those of narco-traffickers who cross the porous Bolivian and Colombian borders, but also guns sold on the black market by crooked policemen or soldiers.Nonetheless, a key Bolsonaro campaign pledge is to loosen gun control. &quot;Guns are tools that can be used to kill or save lives,&quot; depending on who&#x27;s handling them, he said.Many see Bolsonaro as a kind of tropical Donald Trump but for some analysts the comparison with the US president is chilling, given the levels of Brazil&#x27;s violence. Trump&#x27;s arrival in the White House caused &quot;a considerable rise in hate crimes because people who are behind this kind of act are legitimized by someone like this,&quot; said sociologist Glauber Sezerino.The risk is that the far-right will be emboldened to attack &quot;black, homosexual, transgender or even left-wing supporters,&quot; warns Sezerino.Bolsonaro&#x27;s pledge to loosen gun laws &quot;could be inspired by the United States, where you can buy small arms at Wall-Mart,&quot; said Sezerino.The far-right leader can also count on a powerful gun lobby in parliament.<div>- &quot;Hunting season&quot; -</div>Bolsonaro has also said he would lower the threshold for background mental health checks needed to purchase a gun, as well as cut waiting times for the right to carry a weapon, which can sometimes be a year.Sezerino fears that if Bolsonaro becomes president, his slogan, &quot;a good bandit is a dead bandit&quot; could set off &quot;hunting season&quot; on criminals in Brazil&#x27;s favelas or other dangerous areas.And he would only have to claim presidential prerogative to call in the army and the security forces.Brazil&#x27;s police appear to need no encouragement. Last year 5,144 people were killed by police, an increase of 20 percent and a figure deplored by Amnesty International.But violence is not simply an urban problem in this vast country.Bolsonaro&#x27;s view is that &quot;the big landowners must have easier access to carrying arms to deal with the movement of landless peasants&quot; claiming land, such as indigenous people, said Sezerino.&quot;They will expel people who occupy properties,&quot; said Szerino. The inference is clear -- by force.

Many see Bolsonaro as a kind of tropical Donald Trump but for some analysts the comparison with the US president is chilling, given the levels of Brazil's violence.

Many see Bolsonaro as a kind of tropical Donald Trump but for some analysts the comparison with the US president is chilling, given the levels of Brazil's violence.