Jair Bolsonaro provokes outcry after moving to relax Brazil’s gun laws

Conservative firebrand insists ‘people are pumped’ about moves despite two-thirds of citizens opposing ready access to lethal weapons

Brazil Bolsonaro (Copyright 2021 The Associated Press. All rights reserved)

Brazil’s right-wing president Jair Bolsonaro has provoked alarm by issuing four decrees intended to make it easier for citizens in one of the world’s most violent countries to acquire lethal firearms.

His executive orders, issued over the weekend, amend four 2019 laws to increase the number of weapons citizens holding a Firearm Registration Certificate are entitled to buy from four to six, up the amount of ammunition they can purchase and strip back police and military oversight of gun ownership.

Hunters will now be allowed to own 30 guns while recreational shooters can possess as many as 60.

“The people are pumped,” Mr Bolsonaro told journalists in Sao Francisco do Sul when asked about the decrees, ignoring the fact that a Datafolha poll shows that 66 per cent of Brazilians object to gun possession.

The president, a former army captain once nicknamed “the Trump of the Tropics”, is avidly pro-gun and, like his disgraced former counterpart in the US, has attracted a storm of criticism over his denial of the coronavirus pandemic, from which 240,000 Brazilians have died.

Also like Donald Trump, he is a friend of alt-right activist and ex-Breitbart editor Steve Bannon and has outspoken sons who delight in firing up his base.

“Shooting’s a sport. Demonising it is part of a dictatorial leftist plan,” one of them, Eduardo Bolsonaro, tweeted over the weekend.

“[Jair] Bolsonaro doesn’t want an armed society because he believes individual rights should be above whatever else,” left-wing congressman Marcelo Freixo told The Guardian of the president’s latest relaxation of the laws.

“He wants to undermine our institutions so you have a society where a coup d’état can be carried out with guns.”

Ilona Szabo, a gun control advocate from the Igarape Institute, was even more explicit in warning that an event similar to the 6 January assault on the US Capitol Building by a mob of enraged Trump supporters in combat gear could happen in Brazil.

“I’m very worried because these decrees… have already allowed for an immense amount of guns and ammunition - and much higher calibre guns - to be bought,” she said.

“We have a script here that Bolsonaro is following,” Ms Szabo warned. “The risk is too big for the institutions not to push back immediately and suspend these decrees.

“I feel this is a really dangerous moment because, unfortunately, the new illiberal leaders of the world undermine democracy from within. And that has started in Brazil, I’m absolutely sure of it.”