Brazil’s Lula government to ban or tax guns, says aide

BRASILIA (Reuters) – Brazil’s government-elect of Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva will revoke decrees made by President Jair Bolsonaro that have eased access to firearms and is considering banning or taxing guns when it takes office in January, a senior Lula aide said on Wednesday.

Senator-elect Flavio Dino, who leads Lula’s transition team for public safety and justice, said the next government will reverse a series of Bolsonaro’s executive orders that have weakened gun restrictions and caused a sharp increase in the number of gun owners in the country.

“The revocation will occur… Now, regarding what is going to happen with the existing arsenals, today there are two ideas, one that goes in the fastest direction, which is to say that it is illegal and that’s it,” Dino said.

The alternative would be shortening the registration period of firearms to one year, “to create tougher, more rigorous taxation, which creates an economic burden for the existing arsenals,” he added.

Under Bolsonaro, Brazilians can register as hunters, marksmen or collectors, known as CACs, which allows them to own a variety of gun models, including heavy weaponry formerly legal only to the police and military forces.

Since 2018, the number of registered CACs in Brazil surged 187% to roughly a million people, according to think tanks Igarape and Sou da Paz.

(Reporting by Lisandra Paraguassu; Writing by Peter Frontini; Editing by Lincoln Feast.)