Exclusive interview with the Police Commander of the Pacification Unit of Rio de Janeiro, Brazil

“The repressive approach led to a growing absurdity of violent deaths”

Before your participation in the Third Latin American Conference on Drug Policy, you had a place as a speaker at the panel on “Drugs, Security and Human Rights”, the Brazilian official explains some peculiarities of the function of the unit that manages and expresses his opinion about how to deal with the problem of drug trafficking and violence.

-  What is the balance of the work of the UPP in Rio de Janeiro so far?

- It’s a positive start. The events that reflect violent crime rooted in this community and its surroundings, such as murder and theft, is generally drastically reduced, tending to zero; territories previously occupied by heavily armed criminal groups are recovered by the state allowing the arrival of services, beginning the process of rescuing a social debt accumulated over decades.  Research has shown an increase in the perceived legitimacy of law enforcement and the state.  However, there is much to be done. The program is open to incorporate the knowledge gained with these new realities that are developed from the application of the UPP.

-  What are the main challenges faced with the forces you commanded in the favelas?

- They are highly informal and degraded environments, over which the state often does not have accurate information and does not find suitable sites for construction of our facilities, which makes traditional logistics difficult. This often discourages the police.  However, we know that this laboratory has been very important to improve our actions to subsequent deployments.

- What are the habitants’ responses of in these zones to the presence of a police force?

- They’re highly varied.  Generally they approve, but each UPP presents a distinct reality.  Pacificatoin isn’t instantanoeus, rather a process that consolidates day by day.  Time depends on many factors, such as the commander and his officials’ profesional ability, the type of relation that the criminal leaders maintained with the local population, etc.

- Is there an established limit in the time of that presence?

- The program allowed operations until the year 2014, with a total of 40 UPP in 175 favelas and 12,5000 police agents. Today we have 17 UPP with 3,200 military policemen in 68 favelas.  From here on out, if the settings are modified from those that the program envisioned, there will be changes in strategy, including contemplating the end of the program.

- What contributions have been made from the Security Area for the design of a comprehensive drug policy?

- For decades, we have opted for a more repressive focus, based in the logic of the War against Drugs, that hasn’t given us interesting results.  It was a period in which there was an absurd increase in violent deaths, including policemen.  We’ve changed the focus toward a fundamentally preventative strategy in which the police are encouraged the take the initative with social projects to prevent violence and crime along with the young people, who are the most vulnerable, in these poor communities.  A greater offer of formal jobs also exists that will directly influence that sector which, without social intervention of this nature, would proably be pushed down into the informal labor market or, even worse, the black market.

- What is your opinion on the legislative proposals of decriminilizing possession of drugs for personal consumption?

- In my opinion, decriminizalization wouldn’t directly influence the program’s pacification objectives, because the strucutres that produce violence would continue in other markets.  That’s the logic.