Silvio Almeida dismisses military personnel from the Amnesty Commission, which will once again include legal experts and victims of the dictatorship.

Current Brazil Network - The Minister of Human Rights and Citizenship, Silvio Almeida, reconstituted the Amnesty Commission in an order published in the edition of this Tuesday (17) of the Official Gazette of the Union (DOU). Former members with recognized experience in defending fundamental guarantees were reinstated to the collegiate body. Among them, political prisoners of the civil-military dictatorship and experts in transitional justice. 

The normative act also dismissed the military officers who had been appointed to the Amnesty Commission by the government of former President Jair Bolsonaro (PL). In her first year, the then Minister of Women, Family and Human Rights, Damares Alves, dismantled the commission with names publicly hostile to any initiative of reparation or remembrance for the victims of the dictatorship. For example, the lawyer João Henrique Nascimento de Freitas was appointed president of the Commission, the author of a lawsuit that ended with a court decision annulling acts of the Commission, from 2007, regarding the payment of compensation to the widow and children of Carlos Lamarca. 

Freitas also filed a lawsuit against compensation for peasants who were victims of torture during the Araguaia Guerrilla, as reported by RBA at the time. Now, with the restructuring, the Commission will be chaired by Professor Eneá de Stutz e Almeida from the University of Brasília (UnB). The professor is a leading figure in the debate on transitional justice and a member of the Brazil Coalition for Memory, Truth, Justice, Reparation and Democracy. Eneá had also previously served as a member of the board between 2009 and 2018. 

Constitutional role of the commission

In total, the new minister nominated 13 new members to compose the Amnesty Commission. These include Rita Maria Miranda Sipahi, also a member of the Coalition's Board of Directors and a political prisoner in 1971 during Operation Bandeirante for her involvement in the student movement against the military regime; Márcia Elayne Berbich Moraes; Ana Maria Lima de Oliveira; Vanda Davi Fernandes de Oliveira; Prudente José Silveira Mello; José Carlos Moreira da Silva Filho; Virginius José Lianza da Franca; Manoel Severino Moraes de Almeida; Roberta Camineiro Baggio; Marina da Silva Steinbruch; Egmar José de Oliveira; Cristiano Otávio Paixão Araújo Pinto; and Mario de Miranda Albuquerque.

According to the decree, the members of the Commission will not be remunerated. Participation, the text states, is a "relevant public service, not remunerated." The measure adds that the representatives of the Ministry of Defense and the amnestied individuals will be designated in a subsequent act. 

Created in 2002, during the government of Fernando Henrique Cardoso (FHC), the Amnesty Commission was the result of an agreement between the Ministries of Justice and the Army. By law, it must fulfill the constitutional mandate of recognizing the responsibility of the Brazilian State in the disappearance and death of political prisoners during the dictatorship. The legislation also stipulates that the Commission can only be dissolved when it locates and identifies all those killed and disappeared for political reasons during that period. 

Dismantling under the Bolsonaro government

In a statement, the Ministry of Human Rights and Citizenship of the Lula government reported that, during the Bolsonaro administration, 95% of requests for full reparations were denied. That is, of the 4.285 cases judged by the Amnesty Commission, 4.081 were rejected. Among them was the request of former President Dilma Rousseff (PT), who was imprisoned and tortured by the military. 

"With the mission of reversing the political interference propagated since 2019 – aimed at paralyzing the group's work through the omission of the Brazilian State – in 2023, the Executive Branch reiterates its commitment that the work to be carried out by the Amnesty Commission will be transparent and respectful of Brazilian democracy," the ministry stated. 

Movements celebrate restructuring

The institutional reorganization of the Amnesty Commission was also celebrated by social movements, including the Brazil Coalition for Memory, Truth, Justice, Reparation and Democracy. The assessment is that, from now on, the commission “is fully capable of resuming its virtuous course and returning to its central role in the development and promotion of policies of reparation, memory and truth,” the organization highlighted. 

A survey released by RBA in July of last year estimated that in 27 years, only 10% of the work has been completed. The coalition notes, however, that the amnesty the commission is addressing "is the promotion of the memory of human rights violations as a way to guarantee their non-repetition." 

"Thus, this is the opposite of an amnesty based on forgetting and impunity. Therefore, while we welcome the Amnesty Commission and the reconstruction of public policies of memory, truth, justice, and recognition, we reinforce the call for the cry of 'no amnesty' for those who have attacked and continue to attack our democracy in the past and present." 

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