RIO DE JANEIRO, BRAZIL – A target of a search and seizure warrant on Tuesday morning, May 26th, the governor of Rio, Wilson Witzel, classified the operation as an act of political persecution by President Jair Bolsonaro through the Federal Police. In a statement at the Laranjeiras Palace, his official residence, he called the President a fascist and said that Senator Flávio Bolsonaro should be in jail.
In stating his innocence and outrage at the operation – which seized his cell phones, for instance – Witzel said the country is governed by a President who, as well as ignoring the danger of the coronavirus, launches political persecution against those he regards as enemies. “I will not bow my head, I will not give up on the State of Rio and I will continue working for a better democracy, I will continue fighting against this fascism that is taking hold in the country, against this persecution dictatorship”.
In an unusual move – relating his election in 2018 to Bolsonaro’s – he also said the President intends to be a dictator. “I will not permit this President that I helped to elect to become another dictator in Latin America”.
According to Witzel, the Federal Police is shutting down inquiries against the President and is acting swiftly in cases that investigate his political opponents. In this context, the governor claimed that Flávio Bolsonaro should be in jail.
“Senator Flávio, with all the evidence we already have against him – money in kind deposited in a checking account, money laundering, unjustified assets – should already be in jail,” he said. “The Federal Police should do its job as swiftly as it does here in Rio because the President believes I am persecuting his family. And he only has this choice, to persecute me politically.”
The governor made a remark that indirectly refers to Rio’s ex-governor Sérgio Cabral, claiming that no money or jewelry was found at the Laranjeiras Palace, one of the operation’s target sites. In total, warrants were served at 12 addresses, which also include the governor’s home and the law office of First Lady Helena Witzel.
These “fantastical narratives, hasty investigations,” Witzel pointed out, will be disproved in the Superior Court of Justice, which he claims was misled when authorizing the warrants.
“What happened to me will happen to other governors who are regarded as enemies,” he said.
Source: Estadão Conteúdo