Catholics March In Restive Brazil

Press, Volume CIII, Issue 30396, 21 March 1964, Page 13

Catholics March In Restive Brazil

(N.Z. Press Association—Copyright)

810 DE JANEIRO, March 20. An estimated 500,000 singing and praying Roman Catholics inarched through Sao Paulo last night in a two-hour anti-communist demonstration “in defence of democratic institutions.”

Crowds cheered the marchers, singing the National Anthem and clapping each delegation.

The march was an obvious reply to a Left-wing reform rally staged by President Goulart in Rio de Janeiro a week ago, which attracted about 200,000 people. The rival demonstrations underlined a wave of unrest that is sweeping Brazil. Enemies of President Goulart have accused him of planning a dictatorship. The President has proposed sweeping amendments for land reform, and removal of restrictions on a President or his relatives seeking reelection.

Political observers say the President’s advisers consider him to be in a strong position. with powerful backing from unions and the Army, and growing strength in Congress. In Brasilia, the capital, thousands of hungry workers marched through a shanty town on Wednesday, demanding work and wages to buy food. They smashed furniture and windows at a city hall food building and barricaded the entrances to the capital. Marshal Eurico Dutra broke a long silence last night to warn Brazilians to unite “while there is time." Marshal Dutra, who smashed the final vestiges of a 15-year dictatorship in Brazil, retired

from public life in 1950 after his five-year term as President.

In a statement published by the “Jornal do Brazil,” he said that the “gravity of the circumstances which characterise the present situation,” prompted him to end his selfimposed silence on current events.