Rubens Paiva case is unarchived and murder of former deputy will be investigated by commission

After being archived in 1971 with the decisive vote of the then Minister of Justice, Afredo Buzaid, the investigation into the arrest, torture, death and disappearance of former federal deputy Rubens Beyrodt Paiva was reopened this Tuesday, 2, by the National Council of Human Rights (CNDH). This is more than a symbolic decision. The council is responsible for hearing witnesses, requesting documents, holding hearings and producing reports proposing sanctions against the perpetrators, such as warnings and public censure, as well as other measures for the Brazilian State, if it finds violations of human rights.

“And we can also send the report to various bodies for action”, said Marina Dermmam, president of the CNDH. The representative of the Federal Public Defender’s Office on the commission, André Carneiro Leão, was appointed to initiate the investigation procedure into conduct that is contrary to human rights. In addition to him, two other counselors must form the committee that will report on the case.

The legislation that regulates the CNDH states that it can request information, documents and evidence, in addition to counting on the assistance of other bodies, such as the Federal Police. Counselors can carry out investigations, inspections, inspections, in addition to inviting people to testify in the case, which has already been investigated in court. “Everything respects the contradictory”, stated the president of the CNDH. In addition to warning and censure, the body may request the removal from public service of human rights violators. “This case sets a precedent. We can review other filed cases,” said the president of the commission.

Within the scope of Justice, the case remains undefined. In 2014, the Federal Public Ministry indicted five soldiers for the crime, on charges of kidnapping, false imprisonment, qualified homicide, procedural fraud and concealment of a corpse. The case was halted by an injunction from the Federal Supreme Court (STF), after the complaint was accepted by the 1st instance and confirmed by the 2nd instance of the Federal Court. The accused claim that the crimes are covered by the Amnesty Law of 1979. None of them were punished. Paiva’s death was also investigated by the National Truth Commission (CNV) and the State Truth Commission in Rio.

Meeting after Lula banned ceremonies marking the 60th anniversary of the coup

The ordinary CNDH meeting that decided to reopen the case took place two days after March 31, the 60th anniversary of the coup that deposed President João Goulart. In the week leading up to the date, President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva ordered ministries to suspend all ceremonies related to the coup, which provoked rejection from entities defending human rights, at the same time as it received support from the Minister of Defense, José Múcio Monteiro Filho.

The Paiva case was one of the most emblematic of human rights violations during the military dictatorship (1964-1985). He was then a deputy and his name was included in the first list of politicians impeached in 1964 based on the Institutional Act-1. On January 20, 1971, the former PTB deputy was surprised at his home in Rio by a team of agents from the Aeronautics Information and Security Center (CISA).

Hours earlier, the military had detained two women at Galeão Airport, in Rio, one of whom was carrying tickets for Paiva. They came from Chile, where they had met with political exiles. Paiva was first taken to an Air Force department and was then handed over to the Information Operations Detachment (DOI) of the 1st Army. There he was tortured to death; Later, the military promoted a farce in which they simulated Paiva’s rescue by “subversives”, justifying his disappearance. Everything confirmed by statements from officers involved in the case to the MPF and the Truth Commissions.

At the time, one of the women detained with Paiva, professor Cecília Viveiros de Castro, wrote a letter that was read in Congress in June 1971 by the president of the MDB, federal deputy Oscar Pedroso Horta. The document was 26 pages long. “After spending time with my son and daughter-in-law in Santiago, I started the return trip on January 19, 1971”, wrote Cecília. Horta took the case to the then Council for the Defense of Human Rights (CDDPH), a predecessor body of the current CNDH.

The parliamentarian’s action aroused a reaction from the barracks – the country was then under the presidency of General Emílio Garrastazu Médici, the third government of the military dictatorship (1964-1985). The military believed that the simple complaint could “fuel the smear campaign against Brazil”. The CDDPH analyzed Horta’s complaint and the vote was tied at 3 to 3, with the tie-breaking vote given by Minister Buzaid, determining the case to be closed.

It was this act that the current CNDH canceled, under the allegation of irregularities in the vote taken in 1971. According to data presented this Tuesday at the CNDH session by historian Leonardo Fetter da Silva, one of the councilors at the time was forced to vote for the archiving of the case, which would render the decision taken in 1971 null and void. This is how the current members of the council decided after listening to Vera Paiva, daughter of the former federal deputy.

“It was an emotional session. My children and I attended. Memory and truth work in layers. We just came out of a government whose president defended torture,” he said. Vera refers to Jair Bolsonaro. She witnessed the day that the then congressman spat on her father’s bust, during his inauguration in Congress. “I was there. We finally had a place where we could take flowers.” The former deputy’s body was never found.

The Paiva case became emblematic even when the Brazilian State decided to make reparations to those affected by the regime’s acts during the government of Fernando Henrique Cardoso. A symbol of this decision was the embrace of Eunice Paiva, Vera’s mother and widow of the former deputy, with the then-chief minister of the Military House, General Alberto Cardoso.

That was when the Commission on Political Deaths and Disappearances was established, which investigates the circumstances in which the violations occurred and determines measures, such as issuing a death certificate to the relatives of the disappeared. This commission, of which Vera Paiva was part, was closed when the lights went out during the Bolsonaro government. And the Lula government has been refusing to reopen it. “There is a mistake on the part of the government by not reopening the commission,” she said.