The brazilian police has many different forces. Usually they are to be seen standing in the streets, heavily armed, doing nothing. At least this is my impression=D

Appaerently, since more people are required to work in the police for the world cup people could do a three month course to become a policeman. They must be very well qualified=D

In Lapa, where there are a lot of bars and clubs, there are always four policemen on horses. Usually standing around, just being there=D

Basically nobody here likes the policemen. Appaerently they are violent and corrupt, just nobody trusts them.

In the pacified Favelas there are the UPP bases, the police bases in the Favelas. They are even less respected. People living in the Favelas say that the situation now is worse than before when the Favelas were in the hands of the drugdealers. Before, appaerentaly, there were a lot of shootings, but I've ben told that the habitants of the Favelas were always informed of where and when there were going to be shootings. So everyone knew where they couldn't go and when. Now in the bigger Favelas there are still shootings, just now they are between the police and the drugdealers. Nobody knows when they are going to be and where.
The people don't know anymore who they can trust and who they can't, before they had their strict rules, made by the ruling drugdealers. Now The drugdealers rules don't count anymore, since the police intervened. Nobody know which rules to live after, whom to trust and what to do. Where before everything was organized and dominated by the drugdealers it's now somewhere in between the police and the drugdealers and there is no secure line to follow anymore.
Also all the violence that was happening when the police entered to ,,conquer'' the Favelas was obviously not very welcomed by the habitants.
So their opinion is: The violence was bad, the situation now is worse, and they don't trust the police. So I'm not sure how good the pacification of the Favelas really is.
This the people said living in Rocinha, the biggest Favela in Rio.

The people living in the smaller communities said this: before there wasn't really much violence, since it was a small Favela an then the police came, put up their base and stayed. They don't really like them either, but the situation hasn't really changed for them.
The other day I was playing soccer with the kids, and the policemen working and staying in the Favela came walking around and looking for nothing. In the smaller communities their job is incredibly useless...

The richer people believe the pacification is a good thing. They say that before where there was a parallel power to the government in the Favelas, which can't be tolerated. The drugdealers made their own law and justice and that shouldn't jsut be accepted. I guess in a way they are right, but if the common law and justice will ever really be ruleing in the Favelas... I'm not sure.

Then the other day we were driving, 3 people in a car where there were only supposed to be 2. I was driving, since my friends didn't have a licence and suddenly a policecar with flashing lights turns up in front of us. I get kind of worried and ask what this car is about. My friend says: oh it's just guardia civil, they don't do anything. Which turned out to be correct. So really it's just policemen in a car, driving around with flashing lights and doing nothing. It's absolutely ridiculous=D

But that's the way it is around here, or the way I've experienced it. So far I haven't had any problems with the police, and I think it would be best if it stayed that way.

There is a lot more to be told about the police, but I might get there another day or if you just read the newspapers you'll be hearing a lot about them too