Brazil Congress Considers Repeal of Agreement Unifying Portuguese Orthography

RIO DE JANEIRO, BRAZIL – A committee in the Brazil’s Lower House discussed yesterday, September 3rd, a request to repeal the orthographic agreement signed between  Portuguese-speaking countries, which has been in force for over ten years.

The debate will take place in the Chamber of Deputies’ Education Committee, after two postponements, at the request of Deputy Jaziel Pereira de Sousa, with the concurrence of Deputy Paula Belmonte.

On Facebook, Jaziel Pereira said he called the meeting because “the agreement for orthographic unification of the Portuguese language in Portuguese-speaking countries did not achieve the expected effectiveness”.

The Brazilian parliamentarian, known for controversial positions, such as a project that seeks to ban transvestites and transsexuals from using their social name in schools, argued that “the time has come” to discuss the agreement, in the name of “the authenticity of the spoken and written language”.

In the request submitted last April on the call for a public hearing, Jaziel Pereira noted that “President Jair Bolsonaro expressed the prospect of revocation of this agreement,” thus justifying the decision to bring forward the debate in Parliament.