Presidential election: which path will Brazil take?
Brazilians will vote on Sunday on whether they want Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva to serve another term - his fourth - as president. Lula's main challenger is the right-wing senator Flávio Bolsonaro, son of imprisoned former president Jair Bolsonaro. If none of the 13 candidates secures a sufficient majority in the first round, a second round of voting will take place on 25 October.
A new challenge for democracy
El País backs Lula:
“In the face of a Trump administration that is deepening its ties with conservative governments and movements in Latin America and has revived the old imperialist 'backyard' doctrine, Brazil is a diplomatic counterweight of the first order. ... Lula, a symbol of global progressivism, has championed strategic autonomy and multilateralism – priorities that Bolsonaro Jr. would undermine to align himself with Trump. And above all there is the strength of a democracy that, barely four years ago, had to pass a test of resilience that should never be repeated. Brazil proved back then that its institutions could hold their own. These elections will show what lessons the country has learnt from that dreadful experience [of the attempted coup in 2023].”
Nostalgia for the dictatorship
Brazilian journalist and entrepreneur Aristóteles Drummond draws a connection between widespread corruption and a less critical view of the military dictatorship in Sol:
“The five presidents of that era, all of whom were high-ranking military officers, were never suspected of acts of favouritism. None of their sons held public office and/or stood for election with their birth certificate as their only credential. Corruption was minimal. Lula's three terms in office and Dilma's nearly two terms have triggered a kind of nostalgia for the military. ... The Brazilians are united in their rejection of corruption.”
Softer version of a brutal past
The Cyprus Mail writes:
“Neither of them [the two Bolsonaros] puts it exactly like that in public, but both men see the brutal military dictatorship of 1964-1985 as a lost golden age. Jair served it as an active-service officer and has praised its torturers ('The dictatorship's mistake was to torture but not kill'). His son says 'there was security, there was quality health and education, there was respect.' No there wasn't. There was terror, lies and legalised looting, but we need not relitigate that here. The problem is how quickly people forget, and a softer, gentler version of those brutal regimes is taking over all across Latin America.”
Europe holds its breath
The Irish Times also sees a lot at stake for Europe in the neck-and-neck race between Lula and Bolsonaro on 24 October:
“The election is being closely watched in Europe amid fears that Lula's defeat could jeopardise the important EU-Mercosur regional trade agreement and pull Brazil back into Trump's political orbit. Lula's victory would also be seen among European socialists as an important sign of the resilience of the left in a continent increasingly dominated by far-right clones of Bolsonaro.”
Outcome could affect the global climate
Der Standard is concerned for the Brazilian rainforest:
“The greatest threat posed by a Bolsonaro presidency is that to the Amazon rainforest, the world's most important CO2 sink. Under his father, deforestation – mostly illegal but tolerated – increased by 75 percent; under Lula it decreased significantly and was set to go down to zero by 2030. Four more years of Bolsonaro rule, however, would likely bring even more aggressive deforestation than before. ... Further deforestation, combined with rising global temperatures, could transform two-thirds of the vast rainforest into a savannah-like ecosystem, the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research (PIK) warned in a recent study. The impact on the global climate would be catastrophic.”