Benedita da silva biography book

Brazilian politician

At a Glance…

Exception to the Rules

Entered Politics

Helped Draft Constitution

Ran for Mayor

Sources

“Three times a minority” in a country where people are only beginning to admit racism is a force to be reckoned with, Benedita da Silva came from the bottom of society to assume a position of leadership in Brazilian politics.

Brazil is an ethnically diverse country in eastern central South America.

An estimated 10 percent of its 150 million people are of African descent, and an additional third of the population is racially mixed. Yet in a nation with more blacks than any other except Nigeria, only nine elected members of Brazil’s congress, the Chamber of Deputies, are black.

Of the chamber’s 569 members, only 25 are women. In addition, blacks and people of mixed racial descent make up a disproportionate percentage of the country’s lower class population.

In an interview with the New