PGR speaks out in favor of an investigation against Nikolas for calling Lula a “thief”

The Attorney General’s Office (PGR) spoke out in favor of opening an investigation against federal deputy Nikolas Ferreira (PL-MG) for calling President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva (PT) a “thief”. The parliamentarian made the statement during the Transatlantic Summit of the United Nations (UN), in November 2023.

The PGR forwarded the opinion to the office of minister Luiz Fux, rapporteur of the case. “I defended life from conception at the UN, I addressed ideological indoctrination and the cultural war and I also exposed the hypocrisy of environmental activists, so active in the last four years and now disappeared while the fire consumes the Amazon and the Pantanal. I also did not fail to reinforce that Lula is a thief and his place is in jail”, commented the deputy after the event.

In January, the then executive secretary of the Ministry of Justice, Ricardo Cappelli, who was in charge of the department, requested that the case be investigated by the Federal Police. The ministry pointed out that Nikolas committed an alleged crime of insult by making a “speech offensive to the honor” of the president.

Before deciding on the topic, Fux asked for a statement from the PGR. In the document, the deputy attorney general of the Republic, Hindemburgo Chateaubriand, acknowledged that Nikolas has parliamentary immunity, but highlighted that the prerogative “does not extend to situations that, being foreign to this cause, transform it into a privilege”.

Nikolas commented on the PGR’s opinion in a post on social media. “Article 53 of the Constitution is extremely clear in providing that one of the indispensable elements for parliamentary exercise is material immunity, which ensures the right not to be prosecuted for one’s opinions, words and votes in the strict fulfillment of one’s mandate. What happens this is narrative and persecution”, said the deputy.