Former Brazil president Bolsonaro faces serious charges

An 884-page police report has laid charges against former Brazilian president Jair Bolsonaro that he was involved in a plot to remain in office even after his defeat in the hard-fought 2022 presidential election which he had lost to leftist Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva by 2.1 million votes.

As he did not concede his defeat his supporters stormed into the streets and blocked highways before he accepted his defeat. Again the crowd surrounded the Presidential Palace, the Supreme Court and Parliament in Brasilia and tried to break into the buildings.

The report says that Bolsonaro was preparing for the coup even before the election result was announced, and his close aides in the cabinet and in the army were involved in it. Bolsonaro has denied the charges and said that the charges were based on creativity and not on facts. He said his lawyers are reviewing the report and he would fight the case.

The report has some riveting facts and includes audio recordings of some of the army officers, who wanted to keep leftist Lula out and help Bolosnaro remain in office. One of the recordings, which has not been made public but has been obtained by the Associated Press news agency, reveals the exchange between two top army officers. The exchange shows that some at least in the army were willing to risk a civil war in Brazil.

A sub-commander of the army’s special forces, Colonel Robert Raimundo Criscuoli, tells retired Brigadier General Mario Fernandes, who was then second in command to the general secretary of the presidency, “It will either be a civil war now or civil war later. We have a justification now for civil war. People are on the streets. We have massive support.”

What is interesting of course is that Bolsonaro finally conceded defeat, fled the country to Florida and returned to Brazil after months. It seemed that Bolsonaro followed the example set by President Donald Trump after his defeat in the 2020 American presidential election. He addressed a crowd of his supporters in Washington who then marched to the US Capitol and attacked the Senate with the intention of preventing then Vice President Mike Spence from certifying the election of Joe Biden on January 6, 2021.

Of course, the attack on the Senate was repelled by the security guards at the Capitol Hill, Trump relented and Biden was sworn in as president on January 20, 2021. In Brasilia too, Bolsonaro backed off, and Lula was sworn in as president.

The seriousness of the charges against Bolsonaro lies in the fact that he was preparing to thwart the election. During the campaign he pointed an accusing finger at the electronic voting machines (EVMs) as though he knew he was losing. And from there to planning to continue in power with the help of the army makes it a criminal intent. But the police have to prove the charges that they have brought against the former president.

There is also the more serious charge that Bolsonaro was aware of the assassination attempt against Lula. Brazil has gone through this trauma of their top leaders caught in the legal tussles and the leaders were sent to prison. Lula was accused of corruption and he was sent to prison. The Supreme Court later overturned the conviction and Lula contested the presidential elections in 2022.

Lula’s successor, Dilma Rousseff, had been a popular president as well as controversial. She was impeached in 2016. So, Brazil has faced political storms and it seems to have weathered them all. What happens to Lula, Rousseff and Bolsonaro is not as important as what happens to Brazil and its democracy. Through the controversies that have rocked the Brazilian democratic system, it has managed to survive.