in favor of limiting women in the Armed Forces

The Attorney General’s Office (AGU) defended, in opinions sent to the Federal Supreme Court (STF), the end of three Direct Actions of Unconstitutionality that question the restriction of women to some positions in the Armed Forces. The ADIs, authored by deputy attorney Elizeta Ramos, were filed in October 2023, a period in which she temporarily held the position of head of the Attorney General’s Office (PGR).

The AGU’s position, in favor of rules that limit female participation in Army, Navy and Air Force activities, was based on documents from the Armed Forces, also attached to the opinion sent to the STF.

In one of the documents, the Army said that the inclusion of women in certain roles could compromise military performance in combat situations because of “female physiology.”

“It is necessary to recognize that female physiology, reflected in the execution of specific tasks in the combat zone, can compromise military performance in combat operations, depending on the operational environment,” wrote Colonel Sandro Ernesto Gomes, head of legal advice at the office of the Force commander, General Tomás Paiva.

The text also considers that situations in which the “use of violence reaches its limits, consequently, extreme physical and mental effort is also required from professional combatants”.

The AGU welcomed the arguments presented by the Army, but Chief Minister Jorge Messias tried to soften the speech. The strategy aims to prevent the STF from following the same understanding applied in actions against Military Police competitions in several states – such as the Federal District, Santa Catarina and Pará -, in which it overturned the restriction of vacancies for women.

Messias argued that the composition of the Armed Forces career requires its own composition criteria. “Thus, given its marked differentiation with other careers, notably in view of the nature of the duties performed, any establishment of different access criteria for the exercise of certain activities in the Armed Forces, does not, in itself, constitute a discriminatory measure or disproportionate,” he wrote.

PGR argued against restrictions on women

In the ADIs, PGR Elizeta Ramos argued that the Federal Constitution ensures that 100% of the vacancies available in recruitment competitions must be accessible to women, without gender discrimination and on equal terms with male candidates.

In ADI 7,500, the argument is that, although Law 12,464/2011 does not expressly prohibit the entry of women into the Air Force, some of its provisions allow notices to create impediments to female vacancies, requiring male skills, attributes and physical performance.

In ADI 7,501, the request is for changes to Law 9,519/1997 that allow the Navy commander to decide in which training schools, courses, training and activities male and female officers will be employed. The action defends that the percentages of positions allocated to men and women are fixed by an act of the Executive Branch.

In ADI 7,502, Ramos states that Law 12,705/2012, which provides for the requirements for access to training courses for officers and career sergeants in the Army, established that the entry of women into the military military line would be made possible within five years. This forecast, according to the PGR, allows teaching lines aimed exclusively at men. Furthermore, even after the end of this period, admission competitions to the Army Cadet Preparatory School (EsPCEx), responsible for training courses, reserved for female candidates, according to Ramos, “tiny percentages”, around 10% of vacancies.