Aldo Rabelo says he ‘would have declared a state of siege’ to save Dilma

In a statement with a strong impact, the former minister, who was part of the governments of and , revealed that, as Minister of Defense during the impeachment crisis, he would have prepared a State of Siege decree if then President Dilma had requested it. The statement was made in an interview with Marco Antonio Villa, on the program Only the Truth is Worthwhere Rebelo drew a direct parallel with the accusations of an attempted coup d’état against the former president, which he considers untenable.

With a long history on the left, having been a member of the Left for 40 years and president of the Chamber of Deputies, Rebelo argued that the act of considering or drafting decrees for moments of crisis, such as the State of Siege or Defense, is provided for in the Constitution. “If [a presidente Dilma] If you had asked me, I, as Minister of Defense, would have done it and presented it. […] Now, would it be a crime? Would I be a scammer? Ah, what is that, please”, asked Rebelo, arguing that the preparation of such a document would be the fulfillment of a presidential prerogative, and not a coup act.

Using this logic, the former minister questions the narrative that Jair Bolsonaro led an attempted coup. “I think that this idea that he led an attempted coup is not sustainable, except as a pretext to remove him from the election,” he stated. For Rebelo, Bolsonaro, with whom he lived for more than 20 years in Congress, “was always a deputy who respected all the rules of Parliament” and, as president, “he respected them until the end”.

The 8th of January and the MST invasion in 2006

Aldo Rebelo also compared the attacks of January 8, 2023 to an episode that he himself managed: the invasion of the Chamber of Deputies by members of the Landless Rural Workers Movement () in 2006, when he presided over the House. At the time, despite the depredation of property, he reports that he did not classify the invaders as “terrorists” or “coup plotters”.

“I arrested the invaders. […] I never called them terrorists or said they wanted to carry out a coup d’état. I called them troublemakers”, he declared, framing the acts as “a movement of desperation that deserves punishment”, but not as an articulated attempt to take power. According to him, a real coup, like the military dictatorship of 1964, requires broad institutional support from the Armed Forces, the political class and the press, something that, in his view, did not exist in 2023.

Rebelo’s position, which in recent years has moved closer to the conservative camp and to Bolsonaro himself, offers a unique counterpoint in the political debate, coming from a figure who was a key player in the PT governments.

*Report produced with the help of AI