Rio's LGBT Municipal Coordinator Fired Upon

04/03/2018 - 12h16

Rio de Janeiro's Municipal Coordinator for Sexual Diversity, Nélio Georgini da Silva, was fired upon in an attack last Sunday, in the Northern zone of the State's capital city.

Georgini's car was chased after he left a restaurant where he had been dining with his parents and his husband.

"We left the restaurant and dropped off my parents at home. Suddenly a motorcycle came up and started following us with a gun pointed at us, I was giving directions since my husband doesn't know the region" Georgini told Folha.

"Then we turned a corner and heard shots. None of them hit the car, I don't know what they hit."

Georgini is a member of the PRB Party, the same as Mayor Marcelo Crivella. He is also an evangelical member of the Presbyterian Church, a homosexual and a militant in the educational area. He has been married for eight years to banker Ronie Adams and took up his municipal position at City Hall in January of 2017.

He says that he has never been threatened for his participation and role in the LGBT cause. He made reference to the assassination of Councilwoman Marielle Franco (PSOL Party).

"I can't believe that my professional activities had anything to do with what happened. Independent of whether or not I am an evangelical, gay, I can't be afraid of leaving my home to go to my parent's place", he finished.

On social networks he has criticized the federal intervention in the state's public security. "We would be [just] more numbers in the statistics of a city that is finished, that lives under the makeup of an intervention that until now hasn't even arrested a fly!", he wrote.

Translated by LLOYD HARDER

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