Nelson Piquet could face a 3-year imprisonment for racist remarks against Lewis Hamilton
Nelson Piquet
While it might appear that the media attention on Nelson Piquet‘s use of racial slurs to address Lewis Hamilton in an interview from last year has died down, it seems that Nelson Piquet’s downfall is just getting started. The three-time F1 World Champion has already been criticized severely for his poor choice of words by many F1 racers and other people in the paddocks, but now it seems that the incident has invited some political scrutiny as well.
It all started with an incriminating video of Nelson Piquet being released online ahead of this year’s British Grand Prix, which showed the Brazilian racer using denigrating words while addressing Lewis Hamilton’s collision with Max Verstappen at Silverstone in 2021. The video went viral and F1 fans all over the world were shocked to hear such words from a veteran racer who has always been revered by many. But soon after the news broke out about Piquet’s use of racial slurs, more and more reports came in about how this is not the first time that the Brazilian has spoken in such a way in an interview.
Nelson Piquet faces jailtime because of using racial slurs directed at Lewis Hamilton
Former Brazilian F1 racer Nelson Piquet may be the subject of an investigation after a few Brazilian MPs accused the 69-year-old of committing a “racial crime” by using the word “neguinho”, which loosely translates to “little black man” in Portuguese. Even though Piquet has already issued an apology, he has said that it was never his intent to belittle Hamilton.
Now, Aurea Carolina, Taliria Petrone and Vivi Reis–the three Brazilian Members of Parliament, are set upon sending a legal notice to Piquet. A formal complaint has already been lodged with prosecutors in Brasilia. It is not known if an investigation has already begun regarding this issue.
A sentence in the MPs’ official complaint read, “Treating black human beings in a clearly pejorative way, as Mr Nelson Piquet does, goes against practices for implementing equality.” And Petrone, who is one of the MPs going up against Nelson, said, “Racism, which structures our society, needs to be fought everywhere.”
Read More: Sebastian Vettel to not appear on F1 TV shows: “I’m not going to be a TV pundit.”
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