Lula promotes general who chose delegate in the Marielle case and was accused of being a ‘watermelon’ – News

President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva appointed General Richard Fernandez Nunes to the post of Chief of Staff of the Army. The military replaces Fernando José Sant’Ana Soares e Silva. The appointment was published in the Official Gazette of the Union on Thursday (28), and materializes a normal rotation in the Armed Forces. The Army General Staff is the corporation’s general management body.

Nunes was responsible for choosing delegate Rivaldo Barbosa to head the Rio Civil Police in 2018, one day before the death of councilwoman Marielle Franco. Barbosa was arrested last week on suspicion of participating in Marielle’s murder. Nunes said he was surprised by the alleged involvement of the former police chief in the crime and stated that Rivaldo Barbosa had “a very considerable record of service.”

The four-star general was Rio’s Secretary of Public Security during the federal intervention in the state in 2018. That year, Nunes said in an interview that he believed Marielle had been killed for going against the interests of militiamen in land-grabbing businesses in the west zone of the city.

Military was called ‘watermelon’

In the months leading up to the acts of January 8, General Nunes was one of the members of the Army High Command opposed to a coup d’état. At the time, he headed the Northeast Military Command. This position earned him the nickname “watermelon” in radical Bolsonarist groups. Nunes and other soldiers opposed to the coup were called that because they were supposedly green on the outside and “red” on the inside.

In addition to Nunes, Tomás Miguel Ribeiro Paiva (military commander of the Southeast), current commander of the Army, Fernando Soares e Silva (military commander of the South) and André Luiz Novaes Miranda (military commander of the East) were against the idea of ​​a coup.

Before being appointed head of the General Staff, Nunes commanded the Army’s Department of Education and Culture (Decex). The commander sought to deepen the scientific and technological nature of officer training. The objective was to divert soldiers from political ambitions.