Representatives in the entities from the trans-population and students of the University of International Integration of the Afro-Brazilian Lusophony (Unilab) suffer repercussions from the decision of the institution to cancel entrance examinations for people who are transsexuals and intersexuals. The president of Brazil, Jair Bolsonaro, announced this Tuesday (16), through his official Twitter account, that the Ministry of Education (MEC) had canceled the special entrance examination for vacancies assigned to transgender and intersexual people. The purpose of this selection process was to reserve 120 places on the Unilab campuses in states of Ceará and Bahia.
Unilab confirmed in an official notice that the government decided to annul the selection process. There was an understanding that the edict is contrary to the Quota Law and the principles of reasonability, proportionality, and broad-based competition in public selection processes. In the notice, Unilab also alleges it seeks to fill vacancies, which were not filled by regular edicts based on the Enem/SiSU preparatory testing system.
ATLANTICO got in touch with MEC, and it declared that the question of the legality of the selection process via the Attorney General of the Republic. “The justification it stated was based on the fact the Quota Law does not provide specific places for the target public for the cited entrance exam. The university did not provide any legal basis for the drafting of the affirmative quota policy. For this reason, Unilab requested the canceling of the contest,” says the notice.
Negative repercussion
“We repudiate this act and also believe that this action by the president is an act of institutional violence, it is an act of social violence and a violent action related to gender identities. And we would also like to announce it as an act of transphobia,” declares Kaio Lemos, an anthropologist, president of the Ceara Trans-Masculine Association and a former student of the institution.
The National Association of Transvestites and Transsexuals (Antra) also issued arepudiation note on the case. “They do not want us in schools, nor in formal employment, or do they want us in society, as they want us dead and they enforce a policy of death! However, none of this will amount to anything, as we will not retreat even a millimeter from the fight that has brought us this far, after so many conquests,” states the note.
The students of Unilab also made an announcement. According to the note issued by DCE (Central Directory of Students) from the institution” this action takes place before a scenario promoted by the Federal Government to dismantle public, free, and quality education that will endanger the continuation of millions of students originating from popular, negro, and LGBTQI+ segments of society”.
“All of our solidarity to the Unilab university community. Bolsonaro’s intervention is absurd in the autonomy of the public university! A government that supports polemicism in its existence does not have any project for the nation,” stated this Wednesday (17) Renato Roseno, the state representative, and parliamentary of PSOL, from the opposition party of the Jair Bolsonaro government.
Pioneering
The University of International Integration of the Afro-Brazilian Lusophony (Unilab) originated in 2010, during the government of Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva. Partnering with other countries, mainly African, the institution was established for the purpose of integrating Brazil with the African continent, especially with members from the Community of Portuguese Language Speaking Countries (CPLP). The courses taught at UNILAB are preferentially in fields of mutual interests of Brazil and the other countries from the CPLP, emphasizing subjects for the preparation of teachers/professors, agrarian development, management processes, and public health, engineering, and others.
+ The university includes in its teaching staff the first trans-woman to achieve the doctorate degree in Brazil, Luma Andrade, a professor and researcher, who is part of the teaching staff of the Humanity and Language Arts Institute (IHL).