In the same week
that the streets of France lit up with protests
against social security reform,
a wave of attacks
hit more than 50 cities in Rio Grande do Norte state, in so called Brazil.
The media, federal and state governments,
and even sectors of the left
approach the situation as matter of police
consigned to the world of organized crime,
Organized crime attacks
19 cities in Rio Grande do Norte.
Criminal attacks...
Criminal acts...
Criminal attacks...
They would be a response to the harsher control measures
inside prisons.
and leave aside a crucial point:
that the revolt demands conditions of basic dignity
for people incarcerated by the state.
The rebellion, which began on March 14,
has already lasted for more than a week.
So far, there have been more than 259 actions,
such as the burning of buses,
attacks on police stations, city halls, justice courts,
and other state and commercial buildings.
These are already part of one of the biggest
uprisings against the prison system
in the history of the region.
Despite intense criminalization and accusations of terrorism,
the demands of the insurgency are so basic
that they highlight the crimes and the daily violence
carried out by the State itself,
which imposes a cruel and degrading reality
on its prisoners,
violating even the laws and rights that it is supposed to uphold.
We want at least 4 visits a month.
Right to walk in the sun.
Better food.
Light inside the cells.
That the judicial system in RN be investigated.
Cause the judges are biased to deny the prisoners
their right for parole.
We can't stand more torture.
That the Rogério Coutinho Madruga prison be investigated.
Its cells are shipping containers, crowded, very hot,
temperature from 40 to 50°C.
No ventilation.
All inmates with tuberculosis and other diseases.
We don't want any war, except with the government.
We declared war against the state.
The war has started and won't stop,
unless our brother's rights are respected in prisons.
Even so,
the attacks against the logistics of power
on the other side of the Atlantic
have gained more visibility among Brazilian leftists
than the revolt of poor, incarcerated and racialized bodies
in the very territory they inhabit.
Systemic racism decides
which insurgencies will be considered political
and worthy of attention and support,
and which will be criminalize and demoralized.
That is what we see right now.
Many of these actions would be approved and supported by the left,
at least the radical left,
if they were carried out by other parties.
Instead they are reduced to the "world of crime"
and the gangs who populate it,
a world in which the inmates only serve the role of pawns.
And so, legitimate demands
that directly touch on the functioning
of the white supremacist death traps
that are Brazilian prisons and their administration -
even when under a supposedly progressive government - are stifled.
For whether these actions are considered political or criminal,
it does not change the fact that
the main agent of violence is the state,
who will always treat any reaction as crime and terrorism.
In response,
a State of Exception has been imposed
in Rio Grande do Norte.
The Secretary of Penitentiary Administration
has suspended family and lawyer visits.
When there are actions like these,
all those rights are reduced and suspended.
A Crisis Cabinet has been created.
Flávio Dino, Lula's Minister of Justice,
has deployed more than 1000 Força Nacional agents.
Discussions have taken place about using the Law and Order Guarantee Act
to deploy the Armed Forces.
The security operation has already cost over a million dollars.
On March 15,
family members held a protest against torture in the prisons,
and two people were arbitrarily arrested.
In response to the uprising, a consensus on the need for harsh repression
has formed among different state institutions.
Not even the supposed defenders
of human rights and racial equality,
now assimilated into the federal government,
have dared to legitimize the prisoners' claims
against the torture being carried out inside the prisons.
Instead of meeting the prisoners' demands,
Lula, Dino and governor Fátima Bezerra
will invest even more into the prison-industrial complex:
into buying more vehicles and weapons,
and building more prisons.
In other words, the social war
will continue to drown more and more of the poor and racialized population
in pools of blood inside the prisons.
The Workers Party (PT) government, thus,
reinforces its commitment to "punitive developmentism",
which consists of increasing the criminalization,
incarceration, and genocide
of entire segments of the population
that have been rendered superfluous and disposable.
At the same time they choose to ignore the fact
that it's the criminal justice system itself that produces
these militias, factions and corrupted cops.
We are facing the biggest upheaval so far in 2023,
carried out by one of the most
socially and politically marginalized sectors.
By people from the same working class
that the left is unable to reach and mobilize.
The indifference of most of the left
means that we are far from developing a political dialogue
with those in prison.
Not recognizing the legitimacy of this anger,
and not finding ways to include these people
in the struggle for a more just, equal, and free world,
knowing that they will not be accepted in formal capitalism
and will not be considered worthy of citizenship and rights,
is to deliver them into the hands of crime syndicates and cartels.
It is of fundamental importance that we seek alliances and build networks of solidarity
with marginalized bodies.
There is no way to separate this revolt, which denounces State violence
against the people imprisoned in Rio Grande do Norte,
from the struggles against racism,
against police violence,
and for the decriminalization of drugs.
There is no denying that the attacks,
which today frighten so many,
are a direct response to the terror of the state found inside the prisons.