Exactly 21 years ago, the Labor Tax Auditors ETOTESTENES DE ALMEIDA Gonsalves, João Batista Soares Lage and Nelson José da Silva, and the driver Aílton Pereira de Oliveira were murdered after an ambush in rural Unaí, northwest Minas Gerais, 168 kilometers from Brasilia (DF).
Unaí’s slaughter was executed at the behest of farmer Norberto Mânica, known as “King of Feijão”, owner of the agricultural company Ivae and brother of the mayor of the city, Antério Mânica.
Sentenced in 2023 to 64 years in prison for qualified homicide crimes and gang formation, Noberto Mânica was arrested on the 15th in the interior of Rio Grande do Sul. He was on the run. The former mayor’s brother was also convicted and arrested in the year of the sentence.
For Marcelo Campos, Labor Tax Auditor since 1995, the commission of the murder aimed at exclusively killing Nelson José da Silva, who worked in the region. According to Campos, the order of the murder had reasons besides the inspection against work analogous to slavery.
Nelson José da Silva, victim of the slaughter of Unaí – Nelson José da Silva/Personal Archive
“Nelson was the auditor crowded in Paracatu [que abrangia] the region of Unaí. He took care of the inspection, organized the inspections and commanded teams that went there. Teams often composed and reinforced by colleagues from Belo Horizonte. Nelson was a black auditor. He was a black auditor who notified, charged and gave orders to white farmers. Farmers with economic and political power who have never tuned to receive orders from a black auditor. ”
“This was the main reason for the murder,” says Campos by discarding inspection as a cause. “The fines imposed by the Ministry of Labor, at that time and even today, do not mean possibility of any economic discomfort for these employers. So that’s not what bothered the principals of the murder. ”
Order to kill
“When it arrived on the day of the murder, there in Unaí, the gunmen, who had been hired to kill only Nelson, called the principals and said, ‘Look, but it’s hard because he’s accompanied. There are about three more people with him. What was the order that came? ‘Pass the cerol. Kill everyone, ‘”recalls Marcelo Campos.
According to the inspector, “the mynics did not even know who Eratostos was, who was John the Baptist or who was the driver [Aílton]. They knew who Nelson was. That was the reason for the murder. ”
Marcelo Campos’ statements were made publicly on Tuesday afternoon (28), at a round table organized by the Ministry of Labor and Employment (MTE) in Brasilia, with the participation of the Ministry of Human Rights and Citizenship and the Public Prosecution Service of work, in addition to representatives of civil society.
Campos, which began his career in the year when MTE began fighting the exploitation of labor in conditions analogous to slavery (1995), during the government of Fernando Henrique Cardoso, describes that after Unaí’s slaughter the work inspection changed the protocol. to act.
“We changed all our protocols from there, not only for inspections on combating slave labor, but also for rural and even urban inspections that show some danger. In this case, we work with the Federal Police, with the Federal Highway Police. ”
