The International Day of Democracy, instituted by the UN in 2007, is an opportunity for all of us to remember that democracy is about people, it is to the people and for the people so, ultimately, it needs to be valued, preserved and enhanced by each of us.

   It was not easy to get here. Global democracy as we know it is recent, and it was born out of the awareness of the horrors caused by authoritarianism which, for not to be repeated, cannot be forgotten.

 It was after experiencing the barbarism of World War II and the terrors of Fascism, Nazism and Stalinism that leaders of different nations, including Russia and the USA, finally united to create a multilateral organization, the UN - United Nations, with the task of mediating international conflicts, preventing wars, promoting peace, guaranteeing respect for the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and, above all, democracy.

 This movement of historical union inspired many countries’ constitutions worldwide, contributing to the global acceptance of democratic values, such as solidarity, plurality and peaceful coexistence with differences.

 It is with great concern and a feeling of perplexity that today, after 50 years of consistent advances in these civilizing principles, we are witnessing a reversal. Among the countries infected by the “virus of authoritarianism” in today’s world, to a lesser or greater degree there are countries like Russia, Turkey, Hungary, USA, Venezuela and, unfortunately, Brazil.

 In the 60s and 70s, the typical democratic ruptures took place through military coups. Today, they are slowly and gradually corroding their institutional pillars and the basic rights of citizens, especially of the most vulnerable groups. In some countries, the focus of this institutional violence are immigrants, ethnic and religious minorities. In Brazil, they are women, blacks, LGBT population, indigenous people and, of course, a huge mass of workers who lose their rights and become increasingly impoverished.

 These autocratic regimes maintain the semblance of a democratic normality, in the sense that they do not close their parliaments, media, or the elections. Its strategy is to take over the institutions in a selective and gradual way. They do not dialogue with the opposition, they defraud or annul the critically important elections; they use the public agencies to pursue competitive political leaders and candidates; they equip the state’s intelligence and information agencies for electoral and ideological use; they mobilize groups within military, judicial and police institutions to carry out politically oriented actions; they selectively intervene in press organs; they persecute and try to prevent journalists and intellectuals from carrying out their work; they hinder access to culture and information, destroy the reputation of NGOs and universities, and they use public resources to avoid criticism, to benefit supporters and to harm opponents.

 These days, the political strategy of anti-democratic groups includes the extensive use of social media and algorithms to orchestrate defamation campaigns, fake news and conspiracy theories, coordinated on an industrial scale against the opposition of politicians, NGOs, state institutions and civil society. In the most extreme cases, these campaigns are linked to the exponential increase in physical violence against minority groups.

 The young Brazilian democracy is sick and has many of these symptoms.

 The Bolsonaro’s government and part of its supporters continue with an anti-democratic narrative, praise of exception regimes, defense of the 1964 Military Coup, defense of torture, systematic attacks on journalists and press agencies, affirming the desire to exterminate the opposition and eliminate NGOs, among other attacks against democratic institutions and the basic political and civil rights of Brazilians. These postures are inadmissible in an environment of democratic normality.

 And it is within this tragic context, in which we are facing a very serious public health crisis associated with the explicit corrosion of our democratic institutions, that Direitos Já! Forum for Democracy expresses its support to the independence and freedom of action of political parties, national congress, Federal Supreme Court and other State’s civil society’s instances, and brings together, once again, various leaders and their main movements, aiming to strengthen our capacity to reverse these threats through the union of representatives from all political spectrums.

 On this International Day of Democracy, we invite all who seek to preserve the civilizing values so hardly won in the 1988 Brazillian Constitution, to get united in all their pluralities, with empathy and openness to dialogue, to build this broad front with us, reaffirming to all Brazilians the urgency of expressing their opposition to yet another authoritarian project that is advancing in the country.