Citizenship means having one's rights respected

This story is the product of a partnership between Comunidade Segura and the Brazilian Public Security Forum: Fórum Brasileiro de Segurança Pública

INTERVIEW/ Hélio da Gama e Silva

Minas Gerais’ public defender Hélio da Gama e Silva has, in his own words, has found his true vocation. Although a native of Rio de Janeiro, he has practiced his profession in the state of Minas Gerais for 4 years and has created the “Projeto Casa da Cidadania” (House of Citizenship) that aims to install this month the first headquarters of the Public Defender Service in a Brazilian shantytown.

The first headquarters will be set in the shantytown Santa Lucia located in an area “Morro do Papagaio” (Papagaio Hill), in Belo Horizonte, an area home to close to 36 million inhabitants.

Hélio's work as a public defendant has been recognized in grass roots organizations. He celebrated the award that conferred him the title of Associado Benemérito da Associação Comunitária by residents of Nossa Senhora das Graças and Carapina, in the city of Governador Valandares where he worked for two years. His initiative drew the attention of the Attorney-General of Minas Gerais, Belmar Azze Ramos, who decided to take up the idea of taking the public defense system closer to those who need them most.

In an interview with Comunidade Segura, Hélio was critical of the state and municipal governments, in face of what he calls true citizenship, which according to him means to generate an awareness of rights among individuals who lack them. Hélio raises the challenge: “In the Constitution, citizenship comes first and human dignity after. If people are unaware of their rights, how can they protect their dignity?”

How was the Casa Cidadania born?

Fundamentally, Article 1 of the Brazilian Constitution states that: sovereignty comes first, citizenship comes in second place, and, human dignity in third place. This means that citizenship is a condition for dignity. I have not yet seen any Law book that contemplated the issue of citizenship, in the Federal Constitution, before human dignity. A cursory reading of puts it plainly, if someone is unaware of his or her rights, how can dignity be respected? The name of the “Casa da Cidadania” project stems from this concept.

You mentioned that critics argue that the Public Defense systems in the shantytown are unnecessary because there are already numerous state and municipal government projects. What is your opinion?

People say that the Public Defense Service is not new because there are other projects. This is a way of blocking the Public Defense Service in shantytowns. But this is not true, because it is not through state and municipal government projects that true citizenship will take effective action, within the boundaries of the Constitution.

What do you mean by “citizenship as framed by the Constitution”?

The term citizenship is becoming  associated to private sphere. It is being used for pure marketing purposes and nobody knows what it means anymore. Citizenship is the ability to exert one’s rights. Citizenship is the conscience of the individual of having rights. If you don’t know your rights, then you don’t know if you are being offended, or having your rights violated in a particular situation.

Usually, when the word citizenship is used in a project, despite the fact that these projects are praiseworthy, in reality you don’t see the contradiction of the use of the word, which is that people ought to be aware of their rights and have effective access to them. If in a particular situation someone’s right is being infringed on by the State, it is not through the support of that same State that he is going to be empowered to resist. This is the main idea behind the name of the Casa da Cidadania project, because the public defense system is not subordinated to the state or municipal government. It is an independent institution.

The state of Minas Gerais has projects that are considered important in the shantytowns. Do these policies signal a step forward?

It is true that I am skeptical. But there are wonderful projects. The thing is, I cannot see a single project in which I cannot find a contradiction. I associate citizenship to contradiction, and I cannot see it any other way. To me, conscience of having rights is citizenship. Article 6 of the Brazilian Constitution states that housing, education, work, leisure, and safety are social rights, but this is not related to the contradictory notion that is the right to have rights. The Public Defense system is taking this contradiction to the shantytowns. All programs are transient, if a ruler wants to end the program, he or she may do so. The Public Defense system is permanent, it is not policy that springs from a particular administration, it is a policy of State.

How did you start the project?

The idea of Casa da Cidadania arose from the finding that people from Carapina hill, in Governador Valadares did not know what a Public Defense Service was. I asked a shantytown resident if he knew what a Defense system was and he said he did not know. I explained and he laughed, because he thought that such an essential service like this one could not be for free.

After a conversation with the president of the Association of Carapina Hill Residents , who also did not know what a defense system was, I started visiting the community in order to provide the service to the residents, and I found out that most of the people did not know what it was.
At first, other defense attorneys would go with me. But most of the time I went by myself.

In addition to the services, the public defense system established a program to promote the practice of sports. This partnership went further than merely providing public defense services.
But we had no support from the previous administration. And now with the arrival of the Public Attorney General, he called me to Belo Horizonte to establish the “Casa Cidadania”. On May 26, the first Public Defense Service will be inaugurated in the shantytown.

In Belo Horizonte, (outside shantytowns) do you also feel that people are unaware of how the Public Defense Service works?

This is another issue of the Public Defense Service in shantytowns. It is more than clear that most people who need access to the defense system don’t know that it exists, because they have never been informed.

If you carry out a survey in a shantytowns, you will find that 80% of the people don’t know what a Public Defense Service is and don’t even have its address. If we limit ourselves exclusively to Belo Horizonte’s shantytowns, there are approximately one million people, and that last year the Public Defense Services were active in only 1.3 million cases in the whole city, you can consider that the Public Defense Service is for all purposes non-existent.

And there’s more: most of the people in the shantytowns who pay taxes and have a right to the Public Defense Service, are indebted to their lawyers through a promissory notes because they don’t know about it. Also, because of precarious conditions of the defense system, when the citizen renounces the support of the Public Defender, he is actually resigning from a service for which he has already paid for, through his taxes, and he will pay a second time when he or she appoints a private attorney. The defense system is public, it’s not for free.

Where do project resources come from?

Firstly, I have to mention that this was the Public Attorney-General’s idea. He is the first Public Attorney-general to have been elected exclusively by the public defenders in the history of the Public Defense Service of Minas Gerais. If he did not wish it, the House of Citizenship project would simply never happened.

An agreement was made between the Public Defense system and the priest Matozinhos (vicar of the Nossa Senhora Parish and representative of the Archdiocese of Belo Horizonte). If the church had not entered the agreement, it would not have been possible to offer the services of the defense system at that location. We work in premises yielded by the church, a large house in the heart of the community.

Who will work there?

I will be providing the attendance and we will hire university students from the community. We want interns from the shantytown. We don’t have money to pay them yet, but we are working on this matter. In the meanwhile, I have a local, 18 year-old helper. We will try to get resources through the Justice Department.

Why hire interns from the shantytown?

The shantytown interns are multipliers of citizenry. They can take information to their neighbors themselves. The interns help explain the residents their rights. A simple piece of information changes a person’s life.

For example I met a man from the Vila São José, in Belo Horizonte, who had a problem with his eyesight and had no access to medical treatment at the health center. I was told he would only be able to solve the issue through a private doctor. I explained what a defense system was and gave him the address. According to a leader of the community, he went to the Defense System center and was satisfied with the service. If we weren’t there, in the Vila São José, he would have been at risk of losing his eyesight. This is the magic of the House of Citizenship.

You have mentioned Vila São José’s example. Do you envision the House of Citizenship expanding to other communities?

It would be a dream come true. The Public defense system is currently not able to expand due to its tight budget. There are some states in which the defense system is stronger, such as in Rio de Janeiro. According to a rating by the Associação Nacional da Defensoria Pública, Minas’ Defense system is one of the weakest ones, even though it is the second richest state of the federation. The Defense system in Minas Gerais has stood for 30 years; São Paulo’s was created four years ago and has twice the budget Minas Gerais has.

Do other attorneys support you?

All of the defense attorneys support it. All of them.

What are your goals?

Because it is this format is pioneering, we don’t know yet. We are starting something new here, and we are basically open to all kinds of cases. The only difference is that we will start a partnership with conflict resolution (from the Program “Pólos de Cidadania”, managed by the Federal University of Minas Gerais, established in the Morro do Papagaio) for cases involving family and conflict among neighbors. As to the goals themselves, we will be working with cases dealing with housing rights, land settlement issues. Also, we would prioritize cases dealing with health, consumer, and criminal rights, among others.

Where does this passion come from?

I am passionate about  favelas. I was raised at the bottom of three shantytowns in Rio de Janeiro: Pavão, Pavãozinho, and Cantagalo. My best friends were shantytown residents. I am used to walking up the shantytowns since when I was 13. Although I lived in the urban areas, as opposed to the shantytowns, the proximity was very close, because of the soccer and the beach. If you ride a bus in Arpoador, you will eventually meet every citizen from Cantagalo Hill. If you play beach soccer, you will meet people from many shantytowns. In Rio de Janeiro, this vicinity is more intense because of the geography of the city. Because my passion has always been to be a public defender, I was able to combine my two passions.

Translated by Teresa Bittencourt and Lis Horta Moriconi