Army needs more than guns to fix Rio
BRAZIL: When Brazil’s President Michel Temer put an army general in charge of Rio de Janeiro’s security last week, few people on the streets complained.
The latest wave of violence in the crime-prone city reflects the economic malaise that has come with recession and hinders its recovery. It is particularly frustrating because Rio appeared to have made a lasting breakthrough in containing crime, much like New York City did in the 1990s.
Polling company Ibope found that 83 per cent of Brazilians support the intervention.
‘‘Police are unable to handle the situation, so let’s see if the military can bring order to Rio de Janeiro,’’ said Felicya Oliveira, 31, a restaurant worker who has lost count of the times she has had to miss work because of shootouts in the shantytown where she lives.
Soldiers were deployed on Tuesday along motorways that have been plagued by cargo thefts, according to Rio’s security secretariat. Television images showed them inspecting vehicles at roadblocks. The operation involved 3000 soldiers, in addition to police.
The story behind the surge of violence in Brazil’s postcard city is one of a prolonged economic crisis and fiscal mismanagement that has left the entire state without money to invest in its police, or even to pay salaries.
With the homicide rate at its highest since 2009, and a truck being robbed in the state every hour, crime in turn hits businesses and growth.
‘‘Certainly today the issue of security is a key factor in improving Rio de Janeiro’s economy,’’ said Guilherme Merces, chief economist at Rio’s industry group Firjan.
‘‘We can’t quantify the whole impact of workers staying home to care for children who can’t go to school, or who can’t commute, nor the loss of investments, but certainly it is a rather high cost,’’ he said.
While the Brazilian economy as a whole emerged from recession last year with estimated growth of 1 per cent, Rio’s has contracted by roughly the same amount amid sharp downturns in the services sector and civil construction. Excluding Rio, which accounts for more than a tenth of the nation’s gross domestic product, Latin America’s largest economy would have expanded 1.26 per cent
Part of Rio’s budgetary woes are due to massive infrastructure spending ahead of the 2014 football World Cup and the 2016 Summer Olympic Games, as well as skyrocketing personnel and pension outlays.
At the same time, oil prices fell, revenue shrank, and a massive corruption scandal at Rio-based oil company Petrobras thwarted expansion plans. Rio’s previous governor has been indicted more than 20 times.
As a result of the state’s downturn, Rio’s services sector shrank twice as much as Brazil’s did last year. Rio lost 92,000 formal jobs in 2017, more than any other state and more than the country as a whole.
‘‘We’ll only win the war on crime by creating jobs,’’ Rio Governor Luiz Fernando Pezao said yesterday. ‘‘And we need a strong rebound in economic activity.’’
There are some signs of improvement on the horizon, as expanding oil production will help to shore up public coffers, and financial aid from the federal government allows Rio to pay delayed salaries to its workers.