( Spanish) — In many ways, the electoral contest between Lula da Silva and Jair Bolsonaro, which will be defined in the second round on October 30, can be seen as one of the most important in Brazil since the return of democracy, both politically and economically. symbolic.
Lula seems to have been through it all: a former union leader, he ran seven times in presidential elections for the Workers’ Party —at the moment winning twice—, was investigated, convicted and imprisoned for corruption —facts that the politician denies—, and after his early release is trying again to reach the Planalto Palace.
Its strength lies in its 8 years of government between 2003 and 2010, which many Brazilians remember positively, and the consequent good image that he retained when leaving Brasilia.
Bolsonaro, representative of a new type of leadership in Brazil, is the current president and is seeking re-election. They have called him the “Trump of the tropics”, due to his ideological and personal closeness to the former president of the United States, he tends to generate controversies every time he speaks and his electoral base is nourished by right-wing voters, tired of the corruption of the PT , and the evangelists, of enormous influence in Brazil.
Precisely, Bolsonaro’s campaign in 2018 was based on attacking Lula’s legacy, stained by the Petrolão scandal and his conviction, his successor Dilma Rousseff, dismissed in 2016, and the entire PT, and the message seemed to help him win.
But in 2018 Bolsonaro faced Fernando Haddad and not Lula, and it is in these elections that the two great leaders of the moment, equidistant in style and proposals, finally come face to face.
That’s how they got to the second round
Lula prevailed on October 2 in the first round with 48.3% -he failed to win by not exceeding 50%-, but Bolsonaro stepped on his feet with 43.2%, more than expected for the candidate . The adjusted result reaffirmed that these elections are competitive, and both have tried to cement their positions, even though the latest Datafolha poll gives a result of 53%-47% in favor of Lula.
If the debates are any indication of the confrontation between the two political factions, the last one between Lula and Bolsonaro yields disturbing results: both constantly accused each other of lying as a defense against different critical statements.
“Their negligence caused the death of 680,000 people when more than half could have been saved. In the history of any government in the world, there is no one who has played with the pandemic and with death as you did,” Lula told Bolsonaro, widely criticized for his handling of the covid-19 pandemic. “You are the king of fake news, you are the king of stupidity, of lying to Brazilian society. You lied all the time about the vaccine.”
The current president, on the other hand, accused Lula repeatedly of corruption, and equated to the PT with the leaderships in Venezuela and Cuba, of the deceased Hugo Chávez and Fidel Castro, and in Nicaragua, with Daniel Ortega. “Stay at home, enjoying life and don’t want to go back to the scene of the crime. Lula, you are a national disgrace,” he told him. said in discussion.
The election seems to be based on the symbolic plane: Lula, the long-time leader of the Workers’ Party and successful former president, imprisoned for corruption and later released, loved but also hated, faces current President Bolsonaro, a former military man who celebrates the dictatorship that ruled between 1964 and 185, supported by the evangelists, owner of a controversial discourse and based on a right-wing agenda.
But Lula and Bolsonaro also have government programs and proposals that they have presented to Brazilian society. This is a look at his main points.
Bolsonaro’s Brazil
In the Government plan 2023-2026 of his platform “For the good of Brazil”, Bolsonaro places the axis of his economic policy on job creation through the “reduction of bureaucracy” and a “modernization” of the National Employment System.
In addition, it seeks to continue with the fiscal adjustment in the short and medium term to ensure economic stability and sustainability, all under the umbrella of economic freedom, one of its main campaign values, in a context in which Brazil is just beginning to get out of the economic downturn caused by the covid-19 pandemic.
Bolsonaro proposes also maintain its Auxílio Brasil social assistance program, which grants payments of R$ 600 (US$ 120) to more than 20 million of the most needy families, and establishes a series of measures for access to education —with the aim of advancing in different international rankings—and health under the values considered core in Brazilian society: God, country, family, life and freedom.
In the area of security, the Bolsonaro government program proposes invest in the capabilities of the Security Forces and the Armed Forces, improving their remuneration, and giving greater legal protections to public security professionals.
Bolsonaro highlights in his platform the importance of Brazil in the international community and reaffirms the country’s historical role as a defender of the multipolar order, based on the United Nations, and points out that his diplomacy will seek to protect the democratic regime and attract investment.
In the last four years, Bolsonaro has been very critical of Venezuela and Nicaragua for this reason, but he has also expressed doubts about Mercosur, the bloc that includes Argentina, Paraguay and Uruguay, which he proposes to make more flexible.
Finally, with regard to the environment, one of the areas for which the candidate has been most criticized, Bolsonaro’s government plan focuses on the sustainable use of natural resources, and points out that the Amazon can “contribute a lot” to the Brazilian economic matrix if its environmental, cultural and ethnic particularities are respected.
During his first term, precisely, the deforestation of the Amazon increased enormously and this led to Brazil’s relative international isolation.
Bolsonaro, on the other hand, told the UN this year that most of the Amazon is intact and criticized the media for their reports linked to deforestation.
Lula’s Brazil
Lula’s proposals are framed in his Brazil Reconstruction and Transformation Programfor which the focus is on sustainable and stable economic development and, also, job creation, promoting economic growth with public policies and investments in infrastructure and housing.
The program also promotes solidarity economy and reindustrialization with environmental sustainability, and Lula promises to seek a increase in the minimum wage.
To support his economic program, Lula relies on the memory of the growth in GDP and employment, and the reduction in poverty, during his period in government. But the PT is also facing the legacy of Lula’s successor, Dilma Rousseff (2011-2016), when the economy Brazil stagnated and then entered a recession, a situation from which it has not fully emerged.
Lula also promises enlarge the Bolsa Familia social assistance program, and investing in quality public education with a focus on identities and diversity. New investments are also promised in public health systems, which the program sees as a central government policy.
The two governments of Lula were characterized and are remembered for the programs to fight poverty, including Zero Hunger (Fome Zero), although Brazil is no longer, as in those years, in the midst of a boom in raw materials and there are doubts about the financing of these policies.
In Lula’s program, public security is considered a fundamental right, and foresees actions to assist victims, prioritize the prevention, investigation and prosecution of crimes, and stop violence against women, black youth and the LGBTQIA+ population.
Lula promises that the integration of Latin America, and especially South America, To return to to be an objective and that Mercosur, Unasur, Celac and also the BRICS group, which Brazil shares with Russia, India, China and South Africa, will promote.
Between 2003 and 2010, Lula maintained good relations with other presidents of leftist or center-left parties in the region—the same ones criticized by Bolsonaro—sometimes grouped under the label of XXI Century Socialism, especially with Fidel Castro in Cuba, Hugo Chávez in Venezuela, Rafael Correa in Ecuador and Néstor Kirchner and Cristina Fernández de Kirchner in Argentina.
Lula’s new program also focuses on sustainable development, and in the case of the Amazon ensures that it is “imperative” to put an end to deforestation, as he did in his previous government. In addition, he proposes to crack down on illegal mining in the region and improve existing mining regulations.
According to data from Greenpeace, the dismantling in Brazil reached a record of 24,000 square km per year, after which a prevention plan was launched that reduced deforestation by 83%.
With information from Sofía Benavides and Ángela Reyes Haczek.
