Brazil: Rio De Janeiro City Council to Debate Bills Drafted by Marielle Franco

Amid calls from members of assassinated councilwoman Marielle Franco's staff, Rio de Janeiro's City Council president Jorge Felippe has called for a special session of the body to assess several bills Franco drafted before she was killed on March 15. The proposed bills are related to the rights of minority groups, low-income communities, women, and the LGBTQ community.

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Brazilian Rights Activist Marielle Franco Assassinated in Rio

City council members agreed to put the draft bills on the official agenda by joint decision, according to a post on the late councilwoman's website. The website, which continues to be updated by Franco's staff, along with the call for the bills to be debated and passed are a part of a move to maintain the Black activist's legacy.

One of the projects aims to establish a free assistance housing program for low-income families. The idea includes aspects related to security and quality of life, as well as formalized utilization of the overall terrain that would be recognized by authorities.

Another project, 417/2017, envisages the creation of a permanent education campaign called “Harassment Is Not Transient.” The campaign is meant to combat sexual harassment in public areas and transportation in Rio de Janeiro.

Three days before she was murdered, Marielle denounced the deaths of two youths during a military police operation in the Acari favela.

“We must speak loudly so that everybody knows what is happening in Acari right now. The 41st Military Police Battalion of Rio de Janeiro is terrorizing and violating Acari residents. This week two youths were killed and tossed in a ditch. Today, the police walked the streets threatening residents. This has always happened, and with the military intervention things have gotten worse,” she wrote on Twitter.

Also, two weeks earlier Franco was named a rapporteur in the special commission established by the city council to monitor the military intervention in the city of Rio de Janeiro.

Marielle, along with her driver, Anderson Pedro Gomes, was executed in a barrage of bullets at her car while returning home from an event in central Rio de Janeiro called "Young Black Women Moving Structures."

Though her murder remains unsolved, investigators have revealed that the 9mm bullets that killed Marielle were part of a lot bought by federal police in 2006.