Jair Bolsonaro

Former Brazilian president Jair Bolsonaro is facing charges of a coup after he lost the presidential election to Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva in 2022 and his supporters had stormed the Presidential palace, the Supreme Court and the parliament on January 8, 2023. He has been banned for eight years from contesting an election for this.

Bolsonaro’s rally in Sao Paulo was attended by thousands of his supporters. Speaking to them, Bolsonaro denied charges of the coup. He said, “What is a coup? Tanks in the streets, weapons, conspiracy? None of that happened in Brazil.”  Federal police had seized Bolsonaro’s passport earlier this month on the charge of framing a draft decree to overturn election results. Bolsonaro does not deny that a decree was in the making to call the election results illegal. Defending the decree which was not issued, he said it was based on the constitution.

Bolsonaro left the country after the coup bid, but chose to return to Brazil. The reason for Bolsonaro’s return is based on the confidence that the conservatives have not lost the battle and that they hold a majority in parliament. Though leftist Lula has won the presidency he has to contend with a conservatives-dominated parliament. It may also be the case that Bolsonaro is following the example of his model fellow-conservative, former US president Donald Trump, who is facing several trials in the runup to the American presidential election at the end of the year, and by doing so he is literally turning the tables on his opponents. Trump plays up the victim card and said that all the legal cases against him are part of political vendetta. It looks like Bolsonaro also wants to portray himself as a victim. Whether he would win back the sympathy of the people remains to be seen.

He has however sought the release of the poor people, who are his supporters, in prison in Brasilia after the events of January 8, 2023. He said, “What I seek is pacification. It is erasing the past. It is to seek a way for us to live in peace and stop being so jumpy. Amnesty for those poor people who are in jails of Brasilia. We ask all the 513 congressmen, 81 senators for a bill of amnesty so justice can be made in Brazil.”

By making his fightback as one of getting the poor among his supporters is an effective political ploy, turning the attention away from himself. But at the same time he is indirectly challenging President Lula that there would be no “justice” in Brazil until his supporters are released from prison.

The battle between the leftists and liberals on the one side and the rightists on the other is being fought out in many of the South American countries and in the US. And it does seem to be the case that the two sides have not been able to get the other completely.

They have to continue to fight each other in the political arena. But former president Bolsonaro seems to have overreached his presidential authority when he tried to issue a decree overturning the election result that has gone against him. He admits that the decree was based in the constitution, and therefore not illegal.

There is more than a bit of sophistry in the argument. Bolsonaro overplayed the role of the right-wing populist, by denying there was Covid, and by mishandling the vaccination process. There is an inquiry about his handling of the pandemic which was a mix of cavalier denial and manipulation of the Covid vaccine exercise. The people were angry, and Bolsonaro has failed to sense the anger of the people.