Elon Musk has promised to investigate why several far-right personalities in Brazil were removed from Twitter after some high-profile names, including the grandson of a former military dictator, complained they were being denied free speech.
Twitter Brasil suspended profiles of three rightwing politicians recently elected to congress: Carla Zambelli, Gustavo Gayer, and Nikolas Ferreira, a 26-year-old who won 1.5m votes and has 2 million followers.
They and other supporters of the extremist president Jair Bolsonaro were removed from the platform in the past week in response to an undisclosed legal demand.
All criticised the decision, as did Paulo Figueiredo Filho, the grandson of João Figueiredo, Brazil’s military president between 1979 and 1985, and now a commentator for the rightwing media operation Jovem Pan.
“Hey @elonmusk, your company has been imposing a draconian ideological censorship of the Brazilian people’s right to free speech,” Figueiredo tweeted. “We are at a critical moment in our history! Wtf is going on?? We thought you bought Twitter exactly for this reason! Rise and lift the censorship NOW!”
“I will look into this,” Musk replied.
Figueiredo, whose account with 946,000 followers is still active, did not respond to a tweet asking for comment but he did reveal that his Telegram account had been suspended.
His grandfather was the last military president before Brazil returned to democracy after a 21-year dictatorship that saw hundreds of people killed and thousands more tortured and jailed.
