(RSF/IFEX) – RSF has denounced the threats by Tocantins State Governor Marcelo Miranda against Sandra Miranda de Oliveira Silva, editorialist and owner of the weekly “Primeira Pagina”, which has published reports on corruption in the governor’s administration. “We are shocked that this latest attack on press freedom in Brazil comes from a top official and […]
(RSF/IFEX) – RSF has denounced the threats by Tocantins State Governor Marcelo Miranda against Sandra Miranda de Oliveira Silva, editorialist and owner of the weekly “Primeira Pagina”, which has published reports on corruption in the governor’s administration.
“We are shocked that this latest attack on press freedom in Brazil comes from a top official and hope this will not prevent a serious enquiry into the incident,” RSF said.
On 30 August 2005, Governor Miranda warned the journalist’s brother, José Valdemir Miranda, who is also a journalist, at an official ceremony that he would “not allow publication of any more news attacking my family” and that “if the law does not stop it, I will take steps of my own to do so.”
Miranda de Oliveira Silva also told RSF that unidentified people set fire to her house on 17 May (see IFEX alert of 7 June 2005) and that her husband, Reynaldo Soares de Oliveira Silva, had been trailed by a suspicious van while walking near their home.
She said the attacks were probably a response to “Primeira Pagina”‘s independent editorial line and its frequent investigation and criticism of Miranda’s administration, including suggestions in December 2004 that the governor and his wife had “mysterious relatives” and that the state payroll was padded with non-existent employees. She has filed a legal complaint against Governor Miranda.
