Klaus Hart Brasilientexte

Lilian Gonzaga da Costa, 43, who works as a cleaner, had probably never been to the theatre to watch a play by Sophocles nor did she know who Antigone was. In spite of the two women being separated by 26 centuries what they have in common is loving devotion to their families, a sense of justice and wanting the right of the living to mourn their dead.  
 
Antigone decided to ignore the orders of the powerful Creon, king of Thebes, and buried her brother Polynices whose corpse the king had demanded should remain unburied, exposed to carrion birds and dogs, so that the horror of it would inhibit other pretenders to the throne.

Lilian simply wanted to find her son Wellington Gonzaga de Costa, 19, who was a student. On Saturday morning he had not come home from the dance he had attended the night before with his friends Marcos Paulo da Silva Correia, 17, student, and David Wilson Floréncio, 24, bricklayer. The three lived on the Morro da Providência, in the centre of Rio de Janeiro.

Antigone was taken to prison and took her own life before knowing that Teiresias the wise man had convinced Creon to free her to bury the body of Polynices. Lilian, on the morning of Saturday, learned why her son had not returned home from the dance, he and his friends were accosted by soldiers and officers of the army. Why? They were not involved in crime, they did not use drugs and they did not cause disturbances in the streets.

The soldiers took all three to be interrogated in the police station in Santo Cristo. There Lilian, at last, saw Wellington and his friends alive on Saturday morning. Just as Haemon, son of Creon, believed that his father would suspend Antigone™s punishment, Lilian did not fear for the young boys. Especially not for her son, whose dream was to join the army.

Lilian could never imagine that Wellington, Marcos and David would be condemned to the worst punishment by the soldiers who kidnapped them: they were handed over to drug dealers in the Morro da Mineira who were enemies of the Providência dealers. On Sunday afternoon the bodies of the three were found, marked by torture and riddled with bullets, in the Gramacho garbage dump.

Witnesses said they saw about ten military men handing the boys over to the Mineira drug dealers.

Sophocles™ critique has echoed since the fifth century BC: why were Creon™s laws not inspired by divine law? In modern terms why do officers and soldiers of the army hand over innocent boys to murderers and drug dealers? Why do the military police in Rio de Janeiro organize militias for the extortion of people who live in the poorest areas?

This year the 60th anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights is being celebrated. In the courses taken by our police and military students is the subject of human rights seriously studied or is it ridiculed? Another hypothesis is does it mean that the door is opened for the uniform to be worn as a symbol of power and for weapons to be used as tools for crime. Citizenship is violated and democracy is threatened.

It isn™t difficult to know how companies select their employees. What training was given to those they already have “ was it according to the constitution, in defense of the population and the country? Is it intensive training which is harmful to their physical and mental health or is it learning about great humanists like Socrates, Jesus, Gandhi, Martin Luther King, Chico Mendes and Betinho? Do they learn about Greek tragedies so that they are not miserably repeated as Brazilian tragedies?

The armed forces and the military police do not deserve to have their history, their service to the country and to the population, their examples of bravery and respect for the law and for citizens be destroyed by 21 years of dictatorship and by gruesome episodes such as the one which sacrificed the life of Lilian™s son and his friends. Therefore they should not fear the truth, which is the twin sister to justice.

Antigone did not see justice done nor did she gain her much longed for freedom. We hope to God that Lilian™s future and the future of so many families from the favelas “ in this country which concentrates 75.4% of wealth in the hands of 10% of the population (IPEA “ Institute of Applied Economic Research – 2008) “ do not end up like the Greek heroine™s.

*Frei Betto is a writer, author of ”A arte de semear estrelas (The Art of Sowing Stars) (Rocco).

ABOUT THE AUTOR

He is a Brazilian Dominican with an international reputation as a liberation theologian.
Within Brazil he is equally famous as a writer, with over 52 books to his name.  In 1985 he won Brazil™s most important literary prize, the Jabuti, and was elected Intellectual of the Year by the members of the Brazilian Writers™ Union.

Frei Betto has always been active in Brazilian social movements, and has been an adviser to the Church™s ministry to workers in Sáo Paulo™s industrial belt, to the Church base communities, and to the Landless Rural Workers™ Movement (MST).

http://www.hart-brasilientexte.de/2008/08/03/brasiliens-armee-und-die-slum-diktatur-rio-streitkrafte-lassen-drei-jugendliche-durch-banditenkommando-foltern-und-ermorden/