RIO DE JANEIRO, BRAZIL – On Friday, June 19th, representatives of civil society linked to environmental protection submitted a motion for impeachment against President Jair Bolsonaro to the Chamber of Deputies, alleging a crime of social and environmental liability.
The document signed by over 50 people states that within the environmental context, the President has been deliberately and repeatedly attacking “this which is an irrecoverable asset of utmost constitutional protection, and a fundamental right of current and future generations, as provided by the Federal Constitution in its Article 225”.
The text also states that by examining the videos of the April 22nd cabinet meeting, “we observed several actions by the President and his Ministers that evidence the practice of (impeachable) crimes of responsibility”.
During the meeting, Environment Minister Ricardo Salles said that “whatever we do gets to the judiciary the next day. So we need to make an effort during this moment of peace in terms of press coverage because they’re only talking about Covid, and we could get away with simplifying and changing all the rules“.
Also according to the petitioners for impeachment, the Minister’s statement “testifies to the direction, already noted by a large part of society, that the President of Brazil’s government is pursuing an unbridled dismantling of environmental protection structures, which have been built at great pains.”
The document details a number of the Ministry’s actions that “violate” the environment, such as “the destructuring of the Brazilian Institute of Environment and Renewable Natural Resources (IBAMA) and the Chico Mendes Institute for Biodiversity Conservation (ICMbio), with the loss of independence for experts and on-site security to environmental inspectors,” the “transfer of the Brazilian Forestry Service from the Ministry of the Environment to the Ministry of Agriculture,” the “flexibility and reduction of fines for environmental crimes,” among others.
On Thursday, June 18th, former Environment Ministers released an open letter stating that Brazil is experiencing “an unprecedented historical moment of debasement and threat to democracy” and that “social and environmental sustainability is being irreversibly compromised by those who have the constitutional duty to safeguard it.”
The text, signed by Carlos Minc, Edson Duarte, Gustavo Krause, Izabella Teixeira, José Carlos Carvalho, José Goldemberg, Marina Silva, Rubens Ricupero and Sarney Filho, calls on the Federal Supreme Court justices to “ensure effective compliance with the constitutional principles of ecologically balanced environmental preservation.”
The former Ministers also call on governors and mayors to remain resolute in the responsible handling of the pandemic using all available means, given the President’s lack of leadership and damaging behavior,” and on the Prosecutor General to “firmly and promptly adopt the appropriate legal measures to halt initiatives that encourage environmental degradation, promoted by the federal government, as well as fulfilling the constitutional commitment to impartially and swiftly examine denunciations of crimes of responsibility that might be committed by the Environment Minister according to representations lodged with this Office of the Prosecutor General (PGR) during the Environment Week.”
This motion, if accepted, will add to another 48 motions for Bolsonaro’s impeachment already received by the Chamber.