Militias, corruption and Covid: Rio de Janeiro’s deepening crisis

Published in the Financial Times

With Ilona Szabo

Alice Pamplona da Silva celebrated her fifth birthday last year the way a child should. Her parents presented her with cake and muffins, each bedecked in luminous icing and cut-out images of the Little Mermaid. Her hair tied in long braids, Alice beams at the family photographer.

Ilona Szabó de Carvalho, executive director of the Igarapé Institute, a crime-focused think-tank, points out that while violent crime declined in the city, it increased in the rest of the state — a phenomenon reflecting the judicial decision to ban police operations in the city.

“To sustain the decrease, Rio needs to undergo structural changes” such as the professionalisation of the police force and the allocation of social support to needy communities, says Szabó, who left Rio last year amid fears for her personal safety. “It is very early to cry victory.”

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