The Brazilian Presidential Election

The candidate of the left has won a close election over the candidate of the right in Brazil’s runoff presidential contest. Former president Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva (Lula) has defeated the current president, Jair Bolsonaro, 50.9% to 49.1%.

Bolsonaro has threatened to reject the result of the election, and his loss could lead to major turmoil in Brazil. Brazil (pop. 217 million, with the twelfth largest GDP in the world) contains most of the Amazon rainforest, the largest in the world. Bolsonaro has presided over soaring deforestation, while Lula has promised to protect the rainforest. Bolsonaro believes in deregulation and privatization, while Lula’s main objective is feeding and housing the poor, whose numbers have grown during the pandemic.

Bolsonaro regularly attacks judges, journalists, political rivals and environmentalists and has publicly doubted the science behind Covid-19. He pushed unproven remedies during the pandemic and delayed buying vaccines. As a result, the coronavirus has killed 700,000 people in Brazil, the second highest toll in the world after the US.

Let us hope for a peaceful transition in Brazil to a more moderate and people-oriented government.

(Source: The New York Times, 10/30/22)