Dario Di Martino
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Dario Di Martino, Jr. is a Brazilian journalist and politician.
Di Martino is a long-time adherent to Brazilian Integralism, an extreme right-wing political doctrine preached by the Brazilian Integralist Action party in the 1930s. Di Martino is the founder of the God, Homeland and Family Association, a political club dedicated to the resurrection of Integralism.
As a politician, Di Martino ran for three elections: 2000 for the City Chamber of Porto Alegre, 2002 for state deputy and 2004 for the City Chamber again.
Di Martino's electoral results can be explained by his hard-line ideas about public security, police action and human rights, which some accuse of being neo-fascist. Those ideas, when placed in face of the difficult situation of security and crime in Brazil, has attracted a new following within the past six years.
The God, Homeland and Family Association's popularity has grown in Porto Alegre, capital of Rio Grande do Sul state, and many in that city see the possibility of the rebirth of Integralism in the coming years.
Di Martino's party, the Party for Rebuilding of National Order (PRONA), gained six seats in the Brazilian National Chamber of Deputies in 2002. One of these six, Deputy Enéas Carneiro was elected with 1,500,000 votes, the largest number of votes ever cast for a Brazilian deputy.
Di Martino attempted to follow in Enéas's footsteps, but after his great showing in 2002, he suffered a complete defeat in 2004, getting no more than 260 votes. Even Eneas is under severe risk of not being reelected to the Federal Chamber. The reasons for the weakening of PRONA's are the departure of many congressmen from the party, the lack of action by Enéas during the Chamber years, and the general decline of far-right groups in Brazil in recent years.
The 2006 National Elections gave Di Martino his greater number of votes ever: over 4000 people chose his name for State Deputy.
His speeches always emphazied on the need to promote the victim´s human rights, instead of the criminal´s human rights. This discussion is a taboo in Brazil, where Human Right organizations are often accused of favoring the bad guys on their attemps to evade punishment, while restraining the actions of the police against crime.
Martino still did not win a chair, but overcame many politicians who spent money on their own campaigns, without spending any money himself. This gave Martino a new hope and he will probably run again in 2008.
