by Bianca Oliveira
SAO PAULO – Last Friday (12), the President of the Republic, Jair Bolsonaro, published four decrees “aimed at reducing the bureaucracy and increasing the clarity of the rules” regarding access to firearms.
In a publication, the federal government emphasized that “the package of amendments to the arms decrees comprises a set of measures that aim to materialize the right that persons authorized by law have to acquire and carry firearms and to exercise the activity of a collector, sniper and hunter, within the spaces and limits permitted by law “.
With easy access, Brazil broke a record of 180,000 new firearms registered with the Federal Police in 2020, an increase of 91% over the previous year. The recent measures increase the limit on the number of weapons for each civilian and the permitted number of ammunition for purchase, in addition to removing the inspection role from the army.
In interviews to Dire news agency, Daniel Cerqueira, a member of the Brazilian Public Security Forum Council (FBSP – Fórum Brasileiro de Segurança Pública), says this is one of the factors that contributed to the increase in violence in the country in 2020.
“I believe that there is already an effect of firearms on homicides in the country. The weapon has several paths until it is often stolen and falls into the hands of criminals. Just to give you an idea, in 2006, the Parliamentary Commission of Inquiry (CPI – Comissão Parlamentar de Inquérito) demonstrated that 86% of the weapons seized in a criminal situation were of illegal origin. This arms policy goes against any possibility of introducing a rationality in the matter of public security in Brazil ”, he explains.
According to Cerqueira, the fight against crime involves the construction of a National Public Security Policy, based on qualified repression and social prevention with a focus on vulnerable communities.
“There is no single recipe to end the Public Security problem,