Congress may annul session that deposed Jango.
Senate President Renan Calheiros promises swift voting on November 19th on a bill authored by Senator Pedro Simon (PMDB-RS); the text annuls the session of the National Congress that in 1964 declared the Presidency of the Republic vacant and allowed the establishment of the military regime.
The Senate Agency - A draft resolution annulling the session of the National Congress that in 1964 declared the Presidency of the Republic vacant and allowed the establishment of the military regime may be voted on November 19. The president of the Senate, Renan Calheiros, who presides over the Congressional Board, meeting this Wednesday (13) with senators and deputies who presented him with the project, promised to expedite the voting and appealed for the signatures of party leaders to be collected so that the project can be sent directly to the Plenary.
According to the draft resolution, authored by Senator Pedro Simon (PMDB-RS), the National Congress could not, in the early morning of April 1st to 2nd, 1964, have declared the Presidency of the Republic vacant when President João Goulart was on national territory and in a known location. One of the signatories of the draft resolution, Senator Randolfe Rodrigues (PSOL-AP), defined that session of Congress as "against the rules, unconstitutional and illegal".
"It was an act of violence against the Brazilian people and against Brazil. What we intend is to reclaim national history and memory, and to restore the values of democracy," he declared.
According to Randolfe, the approval of the proposal will remove the "air of legality" from the 1964 coup. He emphasized that the military movement that removed Goulart from power was only recognized through the declaration of vacancy of the Presidency by Congress.
Renan expressed his confidence in the annulment of the "fateful act" as early as November 19th, during a Congressional session previously convened to consider vetoes and the Budget Guidelines Law. In the plenary session, he reiterated his appeal to the party leaders in the Senate and the Chamber of Deputies, and compared the annulment of the overthrow of João Goulart to the act that symbolically restored Luis Carlos Prestes's Senate seat.
"Annulling that session is tantamount to acknowledging that Jango was deposed, a victim of a coup," he summarized.
This Thursday (14), Renan and other senators will receive at Brasília airport the mortal remains of former president João Goulart, exhumed today and which will be brought to Brasília for examinations at the Institute of Criminalistics. The examinations were requested by the family to the Truth Commission, in light of statements by a former agent of the Uruguayan dictatorship's repression, according to whom Jango would have been poisoned.
With information from the Senate Presidency.