Brazil: Lula’s reasons and dilemmas | Opinion

From Rio de Janeiro.Lula da silva (Photo) experience a situation similar to the one you experienced in 2018. Sentenced, he awaits the outcome of his legal situation to make a final decision. But Brazil is going through a different situation and that can make a difference in Lula’s reasons and dilemmas. I was able to converse with him to better understand his position.

You know the situations are similar, but with several significant differences. In 2018, even though he was arrested and sentenced, he was the favorite to win in the first round, as the polls show. He extended the term as much as possible, hoping that his situation would change and he was a candidate. When he felt that the deadline had passed, launched Fernando Haddad as a candidate.

Now the expectation is formally the same, but within a very different political framework. With the demoralization of Lava Jato and the former Minister of Justice Sergio Moro, the erosion of the image of President Jair Bolsonaro, the political and legal climate is very different. Even in sectors that were not suspected to be Lulists, there is a consensus to recognize not only their innocence, but also that there was an express operation to prevent their election. What It is a way of recognizing that there was a coup against the Workers’ Party (PT) and that the election of Bolsonaro was the product of a gigantic manipulation..

And that, therefore, Brazil does not live in a democracy, you need to restore it. (Contrary to the statement of the Federal Supreme Court judge, Luis Roberto Barroso, which they repeatedly broadcast in the media, in which he says “we live in a very consolidated democracy.”) Of course, these people still have to tie the cables, for the reasoning to be finished, but the consensus is favorable to Lula, regardless of the decisions of the judiciary.

But Lula’s position is, in essence, the same that he ended up adopting in 2018: he would prefer to be a candidate, he would only be if justice prevented him from doing so. He knows that the dispute is hard and decisive in 2022 and he is ready to face it if he has regained his political rights.

Lula also draws conclusions from the 2018 experience. He does not think he has the right to leave the PT while waiting for a similar situation. For that told Haddad to occupy his spaces, that he did not wait, while waiting for Lula’s situation, it was very stretched. Although it is much longer, it lengthens.

He has already experienced this situation and prefers not to repeat it. He is ready to fight. When they tell him to get back to the streets as soon as possible, he reacts enthusiastically. But he, too, has great respect and confidence in Haddad. It seems that if he is a candidate and becomes president of Brazil again, Haddad will have an essential place in his government. And in fact, if he cannot be a candidate, he will support Haddad.

The difference lies in the gigantic presence of Lula’s image, which led him to be a big favorite in 2018, and the difficulties of Haddad’s candidacy. Of course, Haddad was the victim of the monstrous media operation and Bolsonaro’s flight from the debates, with the complacency of the judiciary and the media.

Bolsonaro has already shown, in his confrontation with Parliament, that he used all resources to defeat his opponents on the right-wing pitch – Joao doria Yes Rodrigo Maia, after having succeeded in marginalizing Moro-, to show that the battle of 2022 will be the mother of all battles.

The left must do everything to count on Lula, the best candidate to face Bolsonaro. If the left is aware that its main objective is to defeat Bolsonaro, restore democracy and return to a development model with income distribution, it must fight for Lula’s candidacy as a central objective.

All those on the left face the challenges that will define the fate of Brazil for a long time. It is no wonder that the PT lives up to its responsibilities and has its own candidacy in the first round, that it has to run in the second round and will have the votes of the other left-wing candidates in the second round. What the PT must be present at the ballot, with Lula or Haddad. Victory depends on the ability to unite all forces, choose the best alternatives and arrive united in the second round.