The illustration used to announce the posthumous diploma of , tortured and killed by (1964-1985), shows the young man smiling, with his right arm raised, holding a straw with his economics diploma.
It’s a scene that didn’t happen in real life. Kidnapped and killed by repression agents in May 1971, at the age of 25, Stuart was unable to complete his course at the Federal University of Rio de Janeiro.
The militant of the MR-8, an armed group resisting the military regime, is one of the best-known political disappearances of the period, due to complaints made in Brazil and abroad by his mother, the fashion designer.
In a tribute held 55 years after his disappearance, the posthumous diploma will take place on July 7th, at 4:30 pm, in the university’s golden hall. The announcement was made by the academic center of the UFRJ Institute of Economics, which bears the student’s name.
in those dark years, he was unable to complete his studies”, Hildegard Angel told journalists this Friday (5). When sharing the news about the diploma, Stuart’s sister recalled that he was murdered at the Galeão Air Base and to this day the family does not know the fate of the body, “whether on land or at sea”.
In testimony to the National Truth Commission in 2014, former guerrilla Alex Polari stated that Stuart was tortured to death to reveal the whereabouts of Carlos Lamarca, former Army captain and leader of the VPR (Vanguarda Popular Revolucionária).
The student and former rower had his mouth tied close to the exhaust of a jeep that was circulating in the prison yard, inhaling carbon dioxide.
Only in 2019 was his death recorded on the death certificate as “unnatural, violent, caused by the Brazilian State, in the context of systemic and widespread persecution of the population identified as political opponents of the dictatorial regime from 1964 to 1985”.
The disappearance led Zuzu Angel to approach Brazilian and foreign authorities, give numerous interviews and hold fashion shows denouncing the lack of information about her son’s fate.
The song, by Chico Buarque and Miltinho, composed a year after the designer’s death in 1976, portrays Zuzu’s search for Stuart. “I just wanted to lull my son, who lives in the darkness of the sea”, says one of the verses.
The announcement of the posthumous diploma took place on the birthday of the activist’s mother, born on June 5, 1921. Before the accident that killed her — caused by agents of the dictatorship, as was later revealed — she gave Buarque a note: “If something were to happen to me, if I were to appear dead, by accident, robbery or any other means, it would have been the work of the same killers as my beloved son.”
In August of last year, the Special Commission on Political Deaths and Disappearances, of the Ministry of Citizenship, delivered to Zuzu’s family informing her that her death was also violent and caused by the Brazilian State.
“That leaden period continues to haunt our lives and the country’s memory,” Hildegard said. For her, “those who stayed, those who forgot to kill”, are committed to continuing to search for the truth and the remains of the disappeared.
