Protests Repressed as Rio Governor Proposes Salary Cuts

Brazilian law enforcement officers, as well as other government workers, occupied the Rio de Janeiro Legislative Assembly on November 8 in protest of measures that the body will soon vote on to balance the state’s budget by cutting public salaries. After peaceful negotiations with the Military Police on guard, the protesters agreed to vacate the building at 5:00 pm local time; however, on November 9, the Military Police suppressed a second protest led by officials from the judiciary and the Ministry of Education with truncheons, pepper spray, and tear gas. The governor of Rio de Janeiro state proposed the set of measures in question on November 4. The measures include a move to deduct 30 percent from the salaries of current and retired state officials in order to pay off the debt accumulated by their government pension program. Officials currently pay 11 percent of their salaries toward the program, but the new measure would increase their permanent contribution to 14 percent while adding an additional 16 percent contribution for 16 months. According to Folha de São Paulo, a Brazilian newspaper, the increases would save the state 13.3 billion reals ($3.9 billion) in 2017 and 14.8 billion reals ($4.4 billion) in 2018, as well as help the state pay off its 17.5 billion real ($5.2 billion) debt by 2023.

The package also plans to raise taxes on several goods, including energy and gasoline and aims to cut social programs. As a compromise to workers who feel unjustly targeted, the governor also proposed reducing the number of government ministries from 20 to 12 and cutting his own salary, as well as those of his vice governor and various other state agency heads, by 30 percent.

This is not the first time the state has had problems paying its workers. Earlier this year, 137,000 retired officials went without their salaries from March until mid-May. Soon after, Rio de Janeiro declared a state of calamity as budget problems led the government to fear a “total collapse in public security, health, education, mobility and environmental management” in the lead up to the Olympic Games in the city. The high costs associated with hosting those games, as well as the larger financial crisis gripping the country, have contributed to Rio’s current predicament.