Grandson of General João Batista Figueiredo, former president of the dictatorship, is involved in the coup attempt

Businessman and blogger Paulo Renato de Oliveira Figueiredo Filho, grandson of General João Batista Figueiredo, the last military president after the 1964 coup, is among the targets of the Hour of Truth operation launched yesterday (8) by the Federal Police (PF). According to the PF, Figueiredo Filho acted in an alleged operation to “spread coup-based and anti-democratic disinformation”.

Together with General Braga Netto and the military Ailton Gonçalves Moraes Barros, an Army paratrooper, Army Colonel Bernardo Romão Correa Neto, and the former aide-de-camp of former President Jair Bolsonaro, Mauro Cesar Cid, Paulo Renato de Oliveira Figueiredo Filho was part of the group responsible for inciting military personnel to join the coup d’état, according to a report from the Federal Supreme Court (STF). Investigations indicate that the organization was divided into six operating groups in the coup attempt.

Dialogues between Mauro Cid and Figueiredo Neto, obtained by the PF, revealed that Correa Neto knew hours before the exact name of the military commanders who would be exposed by the businessman and then commentator on radio and television programs. This demonstrates, according to the PF, the existence of coordinated action to expose and put pressure on military personnel who did not agree to join the coup plans.

Minister Alexandre de Moraes, from the STF, detailed in the report that the military incitement group chose “targets to amplify personal attacks against military personnel in command positions who resisted the investigated coup plotters. The attacks were carried out through dissemination on multiple channels and through influencers in positions of authority before the military ‘audience’”.

“According to the police authority, Walter Souza Braga Netto, Paulo Renato de Oliveira Figueiredo Filho, Ailton Gonçalves Moraes Barros, Bernardo Romão Correa Neto and Mauro Cesar Barbosa Cid would have focused on choosing targets to amplify personal attacks aimed at military personnel in positions of command, who resisted the coup’s attacks, coordinating conduct that identifies the nucleus responsible for inciting military personnel to join the coup d’état. To this end, the elements collected indicate that the attacks were carried out through dissemination on multiple channels and through influencers in a prominent position before the military audience”, reveals the report by the STF minister.

Figueiredo Neto, according to the PF and the STF, “an economist and then a member of radio and TV programs on the Jovem Pan broadcaster worked in this context of spreading coup and anti-democratic disinformation”.

It is important to remember that the general and former president João Batista Figueiredo, before becoming president of the Republic, acted behind the scenes of the dictatorship and even commanded the repression’s espionage system, the National Information Service (SNI). Among the SNI’s various responsibilities was monitoring the activities of citizens inside and outside the national territory.

Meeting

According to the investigations, Army Colonel Bernardo Romão Correia Neto, – at the time assistant to the Military Commander of the South – had an active participation in organizing a meeting at 7pm on November 29, 2022 in Brasília with the presence of the officers, with training in special forces, assistants to the generals supposedly allied in carrying out the coup.

The dialogues found on Mauro Cid’s cell phone demonstrate that Correa Neto mediated the invitation to the meeting and selected only military personnel trained in the Special Forces course (Kids Pretos), “which demonstrates detailed planning to use, against the Brazilian State itself, the techniques military forces to consummate the coup d’état.”

On the same day, at 8:02 pm, according to the PF, Correa Neto sent Mauro Cid a draft entitled ‘Letter to the Army commander from senior active officers of the Brazilian Army’, a document probably discussed earlier in the meeting used as an instrument of pressure on the then Army commander General Freira Gomes.

“Soon after the meeting, blogger Paulo Renato de Oliveira Figueiredo Filho published on the Pingo nos Is program, at 9:30 pm, the names of the regional Army commanders who were still undecided about joining the coup plan. Dialogues with Mauro Cida also revealed that Correa Neto knew an hour before the exact name of the commanders who would be exposed by the blogger, which demonstrates a coordinated action by those investigated in exposing and putting pressure on military personnel who did not agree to join the coup plans”, says the report. .

After sending the letter, Mauro Cid asks Correa Neto to send the observations, to which he responds: ‘damn brother. I deleted this stop’; ‘Didn’t we agree to delete it? The dialogues therefore suggest, according to the PF, that those investigated were aware of the illegality of the conduct carried out and sought to suppress evidence that could incriminate them, “in an action typical of a criminal organization”.

Manifest

Alexandre de Moraes’ decision also highlights the existence of a document that would serve as a supposed manifesto from senior Army officers with a “clear threat of armed action”. This document was “made available to Paulo Renato de Oliveira Figueiredo, in the dynamic of coordinating activities that guided the group’s actions, who published it in a post on Twitter on 11/29/2022 and on the Pânico program on the Jovem Pan broadcaster”.

The PF requested the preventive detention of Figueiredo Filho, but Minister Alexandre de Moraes’ determination yesterday only prohibits him from maintaining contact with the other 32 people being investigated by the PF in the coup preparation scheme.

Historic

This is not the first time that Figueiredo Neto has found himself involved in problems with the Federal Police. In August 2019, he was arrested by the United States police, suspected of being part of an alleged scheme to pay bribes to directors of BRB, a bank controlled by the government of the Federal District, in exchange for resources for the construction of the then Trump Hotel, in Rio. of January. The project was later renamed LSH Lifestyle. The businessman was considered a fugitive by Interpol, and ended up behind bars for a few days.

His name also appears in at least 18 cases at the Court of Justice of Rio de Janeiro, the Federal Regional Court of the 1st Region and other courts.

In 2021, the grandson of former president General Figueiredo was removed from Jovem Pan radio programming. And in January of last year he ended up being fired, when he was already being investigated by the Federal Public Ministry (MPF) for alleged dissemination of misinformation on the station.

Agência Brasil contacted Figueiredo Neto and is awaiting the defense’s position.

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