Federal prosecutor Eugênia Gonzaga, who leads the reopened commission, talks with The Brazilian Report about the race against time to recover the memory of witnesses and identify bones
Nearly four decades after the end of Brazil’s 21-year military dictatorship, the country is resuming its Special Commission on Political Deaths and Disappearances. Relaunching on August 30, the commission aims to address the violent repression during the regime, which left hundreds of families searching for answers about their missing loved ones.
Originally established a decade after Brazil’s return to civilian rule, the commission has been inactive for more than five years now, leaving victims’ families in an agonizing and prolonged state of uncertainty. They continue to demand explanations about the whereabouts of those who disappeared during the dictatorship, as well as official government recognition of the atrocities committed.
The commission’s paralysis began under far-right former President Jair Bolsonaro, a staunch supporter of the dictatorship and its perpetrators. From 2019 to 2022, Mr. Bolsonaro’s appointments to the commission rendered it ineffective, and he ultimately shut it down at the end of his term.
When Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva came into office as president in 2023, he delayed reopening the commission, reportedly to avoid conflict with the Armed Forces, which still harbor significant support for the dictatorship. Lula faced a coup attempt by Bolsonaro supporters early in his term, further complicating the political landscape.
Many within the Armed Forces defend the dictatorship as a necessary measure at the time, to combat what they call the threat of communism. These factions view efforts to give answers to victims of state persecution not as justice, but as acts of revenge.
This enduring authoritarian culture is partly due to Brazil’s political class’s reluctance to fully confront its past. Crimes committed by the opposition during the dictatorship were punished by the regime itself, often without due process, while the atrocities committed by state agents went unpunished.
A 1979 amnesty law, passed at the tail end of the regime, has been widely interpreted by Brazilian courts as shielding state agents from prosecution for crimes such as torture, murder, and forced disappearances, despite legal arguments that the law does not cover these acts.