Brazil’s Lula says he now backs lowering age of criminal responsibility to 16

Brazil’s president, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, speaks during Brazil's constitution law amendment ceremony at the Brazilian federal senate in Brasilia on Friday.

Fotografia: Ton Molina/Getty ImagesVisualizar imagem em tela cheiaO presidente do Brasil, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, fala durante a cerimônia de emenda à lei constitucional do Brasil no Senado federal brasileiro em Brasília na sexta-feira.

Photograph: Ton Molina/Getty ImagesBrazilBrazil’s Lula says he now backs lowering age of criminal responsibility to 16Lula reverses position on age of responsibility for ‘heinous’ crimes in what many see as a desperate electoral gambit.

Prefer the Guardian on GoogleBrazil’s president, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, has announced that he now supports lowering the age of criminal responsibility for “heinous” crimes from 18 to 16, reversing a longstanding policy in what is widely seen as a desperate electoral gambit.

The U-turn, which Lula announced during a Thursday night interview with TV Globo, comes with the presidential runoff in just over a week. The incumbent faces an uphill battle to overturn the first-round victory of his opponent, the far-right senator Flávio Bolsonaro, who remains slightly ahead at the polls.

Ele respondeu “yes” quando o repórter perguntou se ele queria dizer reduzir para 16.

The list of crimes classified as “heinous” under Brazilian law is extensive, ranging from murder and rape to the falsification of medicines and drug trafficking – the offence for which about a quarter of the 816,000 people serving prison sentences in Brazil were incarcerated.

Organizações de direitos humanos e especialistas em segurança criticam há muito propostas de reduzir a idade de responsabilidade criminal, argumentando que elas fazem pouco para combater a violência enquanto aumentam o recrutamento para o crime organizado nas prisões superlotadas do Brasil.

On Thursday, before Lula’s interview, the proposal had been discussed in the senate. The Episcopal Conference of Brazil, a Catholic bishops’ organisation, had criticised it for “not addressing the causes of violence”, adding that placing young people “prematurely in the prison system tends to deepen cycles of violence and exclusion, undermining their rehabilitation”.

O colunista Josias de Souza escreveu em sua coluna no UOL que, ao reverter sua posição de longa data, Lula “decidiu mudar a si mesmo”. Não foi uma transformação comum.

On public security, Lula turned himself inside out. He began defending what he had always rejected.”.

The incumbent has doubled down in recent days in an effort to overturn Bolsonaro’s 2. 2 million-vote first-round lead by appealing to independents and undecided voters.

He has secured congressional approval for a shorter working week – a proposal on which Bolsonaro himself U-turned and decided to support at the last minute, when it appeared ready to pass – and debt relief for microentrepreneurs, as well as promising free public transport on weekends.