Thread: Lula may clinch Brazil election on Sunday

• For Indigenous defenders of Brazil's rainforests, 'Lula is our only hope'

Over the last four years, Wenatoa Parakana has watched the rainforest her ancestors fiercely defended being cut down at a breakneck pace.

In this remote slice of the Brazilian Amazon, pristine jungle is giving way to cattle pastures and loggers are felling thick trees that have stood for centuries. Hoping to strike it rich, wildcat miners are heading deep into the forest in search of gold.

“They’re invading our land,” said Wenatoa, a 32-year-old community leader, as she stood outside the cooking hut in her village in the Apyterewa Indigenous reserve. “They are toppling trees, planting soybeans.”

With deforestation advancing, hunting in the thinning patches of jungle has become tougher for the roughly 900 Parakana Indigenous people who live in the 1.9-million-acre reserve. Illegal mining has polluted the Xingu River, leaving residents without clean water.

But for Wenatoa and other Amazon dwellers, there’s a glimmer of hope on the horizon: Newly elected Brazilian President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva has vowed to halt the destruction of the rainforests and throw invaders out of Indigenous reserves like this one.

“Lula is our only hope,” she said. “He will help us.”

Deforestation in Brazil hit longtime highs under outgoing President Jair Bolsonaro, who scoffed at international pleas to curb the destruction while weakening environmental policing. Claiming that forest protections limit economic growth, he advocated for opening protected lands to mining and ranching.

The results have been stark: Land speculators have encroached deep into the rainforests, and parts of Brazil’s Amazon now emit more carbon than they capture. Scientists warn that the forest is hurtling toward a tipping point at which it will turn into a savanna, with devastating consequences for the global climate.

Lula, who is poised to take office Jan. 1 after narrowly defeating Bolsonaro, has promised the government would turn over a new leaf. Making the environment a cornerstone of his agenda, he has vowed to crack down on deforestation, punish those encroaching on the forest and make Brazil a leader in the global scramble to combat climate change.

“I am here to say to all of you that Brazil is back,” Lula said at the United Nations climate summit in Egypt last month, as hundreds of attendees cheered and chanted his name. “You all know that we are going to undertake a major fight against deforestation.”

Already, Lula has negotiated the relaunch of an international Amazon fund that once bankrolled conservation projects until it was suspended in 2019 amid soaring deforestation, freezing more than $500 million in aid.

He is also courting new donors, including the U.S. and Britain, in a bid to raise badly needed cash to fund his ambitious goal of ending deforestation by 2030.

In a nod to those on the front lines of the fight to preserve the Amazon, Lula is also widely expected to quickly start demarcating Indigenous lands again, a process paralyzed by Bolsonaro that is widely seen as one of the most effective ways of preserving forests.

“It would send a message, not only to Indigenous people, but to anyone worried about the environment,” said Celia Xakriaba, a newly elected Indigenous congresswoman and member of Lula’s transition team. “It’s a unique moment of opportunity, a chance to move forward and reverse the damage.”

Lula’s pledges have fueled hopes — at home and abroad — that he may be able to save the Amazon, nearly two-thirds of which lies within Brazil. The rainforest is one of the world’s most important carbon sinks, absorbing about 2 billion metric tons of atmosphere-warming gases per year, but it has lost 10% of its native vegetation over the last four decades, according to a new report.

During his two terms in office, between 2003 and 2010, Lula implemented a multi-year plan that slashed deforestation by 80% and turned Brazil into an environmental leader. Now, he plans to replicate this success, by once again beefing up policing and offering communities incentives for preserving the forest.

“Lula will have to relaunch this plan, looking at what worked well in the past but also with an eye on the present and the future,” said Mariana Mota, a public policy specialist at Greenpeace Brazil.

But simply reviving these policies, dismantled under Bolsonaro, may not be enough to curb the destruction this time around. As Lula returns to office, he will face a hostile Congress that includes Bolsonaro allies such as Ricardo Salles, a former environment minister who resigned last year after being linked to an illegal logging scheme.

And a powerful farming bloc in Congress could undermine Lula’s efforts to advance a green agenda by pushing forward proposals that aim to make deforestation and land grabbing easier.

“It’s essential that these bills don’t advance,” Mota said. “Because if they are approved, it will bury the possibility of Lula fulfilling his promises on deforestation.”

With Brazil facing a gaping deficit amid a painful economic slowdown, Lula will also need to look abroad for fresh sources of cash to fund conservation efforts, while convincing lawmakers to remove fiscal barriers that bar him from spending beyond the country’s budget.

Experts say that, perhaps most urgently, Lula will have to rebuild the state’s capacity to fight deforestation, bolstering environmental enforcement agencies that were gutted of staff and resources under Bolsonaro.

“The government will have to show that things have changed, that Brazil is punishing environmental crimes again,” said Marcio Astrini, executive secretary of Brazil’s Climate Observatory, a coalition of environmental groups.

Still, deep in the Amazon, where many survive off the destruction of the rainforest, conservation remains a tough sell. Illegal mining, land grabbing and ranching have become engines of economic growth in some forest communities. Here, the appeal of beef and gold — and the quick cash they bring — is far stronger than greener alternatives.

“There will be resistance; these activities won’t stop overnight,” Astrini said. “Because there is a lot of money involved. There was investment in environmental crime over the last four years.”

Lula has offered a different, albeit vague, vision. He says communities can earn an income without cutting down trees, instead extracting exotic fruits, and ingredients for new medicines and luxury cosmetics from the jungle.

In Triunfo do Xingu, some are already turning their backs on harmful economic models.

For decades, Maria da Conceicao Alves Rodrigues, 71, raised cattle on a 30-acre plot of land in this reserve, which has become one of the most deforested slices of the Brazilian Amazon despite being earmarked for sustainable development.

Now, her family is planting cocoa trees, helping reforest this patch of jungle.

“I didn’t want to mess around with cattle anymore,” Rodrigues said in a shady patch in front of her farmhouse, flanked by acai palms and banana shrubs that have replaced the cattle pasture.

Her son, Adivino Estelita Alves, 52, chimed in: “We are planting so we can have an income in the future. Cocoa is a sustainable source.”

But their family’s cocoa trees will take years to yield fruit and bring prosperity. And success is far from certain: This year, intense drought killed hundreds of seedlings. Planes dousing pesticides over neighboring soy fields pose yet another threat.

“We still can’t live off our harvest,” Alves said. “But we’re planting more and more. We want to succeed.”

The agroforestry project, aimed at planting roughly 40,000 cocoa trees in this region, shows a way forward while highlighting the challenges that lie ahead. Unlike soybean plantations, which require vast stretches of clear-cut land, cocoa farms can mimic natural forests, capturing carbon dioxide and providing habitat for animals. In Triunfo do Xingu, cocoa trees are being planted alongside dozens of other plant species, re-creating the forest that once stood here.

It would probably be impossible without the help of the Nature Conservancy, a global nonprofit funded by donations from companies such as Amazon and Mondelez, which is guiding farmers including Rodrigues.

“For a long time, there wasn’t anything else but cattle here,” said Gustavo Mariano Rezende, a specialist in ecological restoration at the conservancy. “And cocoa has come as this big alternative. But these families still need the know-how to be able to care for it.”

Back in Apyterewa, Wenatoa and her family piled into a roughly built wooden house as night fell. Sinking into a hammock, she pulled her toddler into her lap and settled in front of a battered satellite television for the nightly news.

A solemn-looking Lula spoke from the U.N. climate summit, more than 6,200 miles away. In an impassioned speech, he promised Indigenous people would have a voice in his government.

Lula’s legacy in Apyterewa is mixed. The Parakana credit him for demarcating their reserve in 2007, ending a decade-long struggle for land rights.

But his government was also the driving force behind the behemoth Belo Monte hydroelectric dam, which wiped out their traditional way of life and bitterly divided the Parakana.

Still, Wenatoa and others here seem ready to welcome Lula back with open arms.

“We have hope,” she says. “Now that he’s back, things will get better for us.”

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Originally Posted by harrybarracuda

Looks like Lula could fuck up one of Bolsonaro's backhanders...

Originally Posted by harrybarracuda

As of now, Bolsonaro has neither conceded nor congratulated his opponent.

But, but Bolsonaro hasn’t conceded how can Lula think he as any right to direct which policies should be changed or even looked at you silly school girl who adds nothing to threads with your one-liners

Brazil certifies election results making Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva and Geraldo José Rodrigues Alckmin Filho president (-elect) and vice president (-elect) of Brazil. https://www.telesurenglish.net/news/...1212-0010.html

So, the school girl’s posts added absolutely nothing to this thread. The PB of speakers corner.

Originally Posted by harrybarracuda

He didn't concede either.

Originally Posted by harrybarracuda

Still no public concession.

Originally Posted by harrybarracuda

I am concerned about Bolsonaro's absolute silence for the last two weeks.

Originally Posted by harrybarracuda

As of now, Bolsonaro has neither conceded nor congratulated his opponent.

Never ever made a difference. The loser Bolsonaro lost.

• Brazil’s Lula picks Amazon defender to run environment ministry

Brazil’s President-elect Luiz Inacio Lula Da Silva has said that he will appoint an advocate against Amazon deforestation as the head of the country’s environment ministry, marking a sharp departure from the outgoing government of Jair Bolsonaro.

Lula announced his final batch of cabinet appointments in a press conference on Thursday, ahead of his January 1 inauguration. One of the most prominent names was Marina Silva, who will join the cabinet as environment minister.

Born in the Amazon rainforest, Silva was a child worker in the rubber industry who overcame illiteracy to become a Goldman Prize-winning environmental organiser. Her appointment indicates that Lula’s administration plans to crack down on the illegal development and resource extraction that has devastated large swaths of the forest.

“Brazil will return to the protagonist role it previously had when it comes to climate, to biodiversity,” Silva told reporters at the United Nations Climate Change Conference, or COP27, in Egypt, which she attended alongside Lula.

The pair have promised to make the protection of the Amazon rainforest a priority, even if it means clashing with Brazil’s powerful agribusiness sector. Under the tenure of far-right President Jair Bolsonaro, deforestation reached record highs.

Speaking at the climate conference in November, Lula promised that there would be “zero” deforestation, saying that – if the Amazon is not protected – “there will be no climate security”.

Lula was elected in October, defeating Bolsonaro and completing a remarkable political comeback that ended with him ascending to the Brazilian presidency for a third term.

During Lula’s previous two terms in office, starting in 2003, Silva also served as environment minister, where she gained a reputation as a thorn in the side of the agribusiness sector that has driven much of the deforestation.

Under her leadership, the ministry created dozens of conservation areas, launched an effort to target environmental criminals and used a new system of satellite surveillance to monitor the forest. Deforestation dropped substantially, but Silva resigned in 2008 as Lula began to court farming interests.

In the years since, Lula’s political ambitions were stymied as corruption charges sent the former president to jail. But Brazil’s Supreme Court annulled the convictions in 2021, allowing Lula to resume his political career.

Lula’s return as a 2022 presidential candidate has coincided with his renewed calls for greater environmental preservation. Silva joined his most recent presidential campaign and said his administration would take on a front-and-centre role in the global fight against climate change.

Their position comes as a relief to environmental advocates, who criticised Bolsonaro for pushing to open the Amazon to business interests and turning a blind eye to deforestation.

Indigenous people and environmental activists have also faced high levels of violence as powerful business interests sought to clear large swathes of the forests. On Thursday, Lula also named Sonia Guajajara as Brazil’s first minister of Indigenous peoples.

However, the new administration is likely to face strong resistance from Congress, where lawmakers aligned with the agribusiness and farming sectors will make up about one-third of the Lower House and Senate.

“At the time, Marina Silva was perhaps a little too extremist, but people from the agro sector also had some extremists,” said Neri Geller, a lawmaker of the agribusiness caucus. “I think she matured and we matured. We can make progress on important agenda items for the sector while preserving [the environment] at the same time.”

Lula’s cabinet picks indicate that he will seek to navigate the reality of a powerful conservative opposition while working to make good on his promises to pursue environmental and economic justice.

Last week, Lula announced that Vice President-elect Geraldo Alckmin would serve as the minister of development, industry and trade, and business-friendly Congressman Alexandre Padilha was appointed institutional affairs minister.

“We know that the challenge ahead is great,” Lula wrote on Twitter before the announcements. “But we will work together to rebuild the country.”

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In other news......

Originally Posted by harrybarracuda

As of now, Bolsonaro has neither conceded nor congratulated his opponent.

• Bolsonaro departs Brazil for Florida, avoiding Lula handover

President Jair Bolsonaro left Brazil for the United States on Friday, 48 hours before his leftist rival President-elect Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva was set to take office, saying he had "lost a battle but not the war."

Bolsonaro, who has barely spoken since losing the election, has not confirmed where he is going, but plane tracking data suggests he is heading to Florida, where his security staff are already in place. He has repeatedly said he does not want to hand over the presidential sash to Lula at Sunday's inauguration.

Vice President Hamilton Mourao is now acting president, his press officer told Reuters, confirming Bolsonaro had left the country.

"I am in flight, back soon," Bolsonaro was quoted as saying by CNN Brasil. His press office did not respond to a request for comment.

Website FlightAware, which monitors air traffic, showed that the presidential plane departed Brasilia shortly after 2pm local time, bound for Orlando, Florida.

Before takeoff, Bolsonaro delivered a teary-eyed final address on social media in which he ran through the highlights of his time in office, sought to defend his legacy, and tried to inspire his followers into keeping up the fight against Lula.

Some of his base have refused to accept Lula's victory, believing Bolsonaro's baseless claims that the October election was stolen. That has contributed to a tense atmosphere in the capital Brasilia, with riots and a foiled bomb plot last week.

Bolsonaro's swift exit is a disappointment for many on the right, where his reputation has taken a beating for his post-election silence. His political associates want him to lead the conservative opposition to Lula with a view to ousting him in the next election in 2026.

Some of his diehard supporters at the entrance of the Alvorada Palace, where he lived, called him a "coward" during his speech, according to a Reuters witness.

• Lula’s inauguration: 65 foreign delegations to attend ceremony

The inauguration of Brazil’s president-elect Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva on January 1, 2023, in Brasilia, is expected to be attended by at least 65 foreign delegations, composed of heads of government, vice presidents, foreign ministers, special envoys and representatives of international organizations.

Brazilian Ambassador Fernando Igreja, responsible for the inauguration ceremony, said this will be the largest event with high-level international authorities in Brazil since the Rio 2016 Olympic Games.

All heads of state and government of countries that have diplomatic relations with Brazil have been invited. So far, 30 heads of state and government have confirmed their attendance at the event. According to the ambassador, representatives from almost all South American countries will be present, besides authorities from Central America, Africa, and the Middle East, which shows the importance of this moment in the international scenario.

The 19 heads of state confirmed are the king of Spain and the presidents of the following countries: Germany, Angola, Argentina, Bolivia, Cape Verde, Chile, Colombia, Ecuador, Guyana, Guinea Bissau, Honduras, Paraguay, Peru, Portugal, Suriname, East Timor, Togo, and Uruguay.

Mexico’s First Lady Beatriz Gutiérrez Müller will represent the country’s president Manuel López Obrador. The vice presidents of China, Cuba, El Salvador, and Panama have also confirmed their presence. The heads of government confirmed are from the Republic of Guinea, Mali, Morocco, and Saint Vincent and the Grenadines. The Deputy Prime Ministers of Azerbaijan and Ukraine will also attend the ceremony.

Among the heads of power expected to come to Brazil are the presidents of the Federation Council (Russia), the People’s National Assembly (Algeria), the Islamic Consultative Assembly (Iran), the Senate and National Assembly (Dominican Republic), the Assembly of the Republic (Mozambique), the Senate of Jamaica and Equatorial Guinea, and the National Parliament (Serbia).

Turkey, Costa Rica, Palestine, Guatemala, Gabon, Zimbabwe, Haiti, Nicaragua, South Africa, Cameroon, and Saudi Arabia have reported the arrival of their respective foreign ministers.

Fernando Igreja informed that 16 countries have declared the participation of special envoys, among them the United States, the United Kingdom, Japan, and France. The European Union and the United Nations Organization (UN) will also send representatives.

The executive secretary of the Community of Portuguese Language Countries (CPLP), the secretary-general of the Latin American Integration Association (Aladi), the president of the Inter-American Development Bank, and the secretary-general of the Amazon Cooperation Treaty Organization have also reported their presence as representatives of international organizations.

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• ‘It’s going to be wild’: Brazil braced for ‘Lulapalooza’ as new leader kicks off reign with huge party

They market it as Lulapalooza – a momentous explosion of Brazilian politics and dance – and Maize Freitas would never miss it.

“I think it will be the greatest show on earth… It will be the happiest day of my life,” said a community activist from Complexo do Alemão, one of Rio’s largest favelas, as she prepared for the celebration.

The source of her joy is the death of Brazil’s ultra-conservative President Jair Bolsonaro and the extraordinary political resurrection of his leftist successor, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, who will take power on Sunday during a musical extravaganza in the Brasilia capital.

“It will be wild,” said Freitas, 64, one of hundreds of thousands Lulas The event brings together representatives of the largest country in Latin America. “I’m not the type to cry, but I think I’ll have to take a sedative to control the emotions I’ll be experiencing.”

Progressive jubilation over Brazil’s new start is tempered by the death of soccer king Pelé, who will be commemorated Monday in the city of Santos after three days of official mourning.

Bolsonaro, who declared a period of mourning last week, paid tribute to the man who “turned football into art and joy”, with Lula tweeting: “There has never been a 10 like him.”

Nevertheless, Freitas’ thoughts turned to what many hope will be a brighter future under an elected president who narrowly defeated his challenger in the October election.

Lula is one of us. Lula is human. He is humanity,” she said, recalling the social successes of his two presidential terms from 2003 to 2010, when Lula’s policies helped poor favela residents improve their lot. “He’s the exact opposite of this bastard who’s been ruling for the past four years.”

Freitas is far from the only Brazilian who harbors such sentiments.

For many of the 60 million citizens who voted to remove Bolsonaro from office, the former paratrooper’s defeat was a key victory over an aspiring autocrat bent on destroying Brazil’s fledgling democracy as well as its international reputation.

“This is a historic and unique moment,” said Jonas Di Andrade, 29, a journalist and activist who is also heading to Lulapalooza to celebrate the political success he believes made him the first member of his family to receive a university education. .

“These were four extremely difficult years during which we went into survival mode – primarily in the favelas,” Andrade said. “Bolsonaro represents the past: the past of oppression, colonization, enslavement of bodies and minds, violence, hostility, extermination.”

Abroad are also pleased with the return of Lula, a moderately left-wing member of the Workers’ Party (PT), whose political career appeared dead and buried when he was imprisoned in 2018 on corruption charges that were later dropped.

More than 60 high-level delegations are due to attend Lula’s inauguration, compared to 18 when Bolsonaro took office, a sign of global relief over the resignation of the radical leader whose attack on the Amazon made Brazil an international pariah.

https://mobile.twitter.com/hashtag/LulaPalooza


___________


In other news…..

Originally Posted by harrybarracuda

As of now, Bolsonaro has neither conceded nor congratulated his opponent.

• Brazil's Bolsonaro lands in Florida, avoiding Lula handover

Outgoing Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro landed in Florida on Friday, after delivering a teary message to his supporters less than two days before his fierce leftist rival Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva is set to take office.

Lula sworn in as Brazil president

Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva has been sworn in as the new president of Brazil - the third time he has held the country's highest office.

The veteran left-wing politician, known widely as Lula, also led the country between 2003 and 2010 - and defeated Jair Bolsonaro in October's poll.

There has been tight security for the ceremony amid fears that Bolsonaro supporters may try to disrupt it.

Mr Bolsonaro himself did not attend, having left Brazil on Friday.

A sea of Lula supporters gathered in front of Congress since early in the morning - decked out in the red colour of his Workers' Party. They travelled to see their leader sworn in - but also for a celebration.

More than 60 artists - including Samba legend Martinho da Vila - are due to perform on two giant stages decorated in the national flag as part of a music festival dubbed "Lulapalooza".

"Love has won over hate," read one banner carried by a man dressed as Lula - complete with a presidential sash.

"Brazil needed this change, this transformation," said another backer of the incoming leader as she queued for Sunday's festivities.

Juliana Barreto - who is from Lula's home state Pernambuco - told the BBC that her country was "a disaster" previously.

Lula and incoming Vice-President Geraldo Alckmin paraded through the city on an open-top convertible before proceeding to the Senate - at the start of the formal inauguration ceremony.

The men have spent the past days selecting their cabinet and appointing supporters to key state owned businesses.

In a noted change of policy from the Bolsonaro administration, Marina Silva - one of Brazil's best known climate activists - was re-appointed to head the environment and climate ministry. She will be expected to achieve Lula's pledge to reach "zero deforestation" in the Amazon by 2030.

More than 300,000 people were expected to flock to the capital for the inauguration, which will take place at Esplanade of Ministries, home to the country's congress buildings.

https://twitter.com/lulaoficial

Lula - Posse de Lula na Presidência doBrasil https://twitter.com/LulaOficial/stat...75507452112899

Lula sworn in as president to lead polarized Brazil https://apnews.com/article/jair-bols...1e2b6950514a9a

Little more…….

• Lula Becomes Brazil’s President, With Bolsonaro in Florida

Brazil inaugurates its new president, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, on Sunday. Facing investigations, former President Jair Bolsonaro has taken refuge in Orlando.

President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva took the reins of the Brazilian government on Sunday in an elaborate inauguration, complete with a motorcade, music festival and hundreds of thousands of supporters filling the central esplanade of Brasília, the nation’s capital.

But one key person was missing: the departing far-right president, Jair Bolsonaro.

Mr. Bolsonaro was supposed to pass Mr. Lula the presidential sash on Sunday, an important symbol of the peaceful transition of power in a nation where many people still recall the 21-year military dictatorship that ended in 1985.

Instead, Mr. Bolsonaro woke up Sunday 6,000 miles away, in a rented house owned by a professional mixed-martial-arts fighter a few miles from Disney World. Facing various investigations from his time in his office, Mr. Bolsonaro flew to Orlando on Friday night and plans to stay in Florida for at least a month.

Mr. Bolsonaro had questioned the reliability of Brazil’s election systems for months, without evidence, and when he lost in October, he refused to concede unequivocally. In a sort of farewell address on Friday, breaking weeks of near silence, he said that he tried to block Mr. Lula from taking office but failed.

“Within the laws, respecting the Constitution, I searched for a way out of this,” he said. He then appeared to encourage his supporters to move on. “We live in a democracy or we don’t,” he said. “No one wants an adventure.”

On Sunday, Mr. Lula ascended the ramp to the presidential offices with a diverse group of Brazilians, including a Black woman, a handicapped man, a 10-year-old boy, an Indigenous man and a factory worker. A voice then announced that Mr. Lula would accept the green-and-yellow sash from “the Brazilian people,” and Aline Sousa, a 33-year-old garbage collector, played the role of Mr. Bolsonaro and placed the sash on the new president.

In an address to Congress on Sunday, Mr. Lula said that he would fight hunger and deforestation, lift the economy and try to unite the country. But he also took aim at his predecessor, saying that Mr. Bolsonaro had threatened Brazil’s democracy.

“Under the winds of redemocratization, we used to say, ‘Dictatorship never again,’” he said. “Today, after the terrible challenge we’ve overcome, we must say, ‘Democracy forever.’”

Mr. Lula’s ascension to the presidency caps a stunning political comeback. He was once Brazil’s most popular president, leaving office with an approval rating above 80 percent. He then served 580 days in prison, from 2018 to 2019, on corruption charges that he accepted a condo and renovations from construction companies bidding on government contracts.

After those convictions were thrown out because Brazil’s Supreme Court ruled that the judge in Mr. Lula’s case was biased, he ran for the presidency again — and won.

Mr. Lula, 77, and his supporters maintain that he was the victim of political persecution. Mr. Bolsonaro and his supporters say that Brazil now has a criminal as president.

In Brasília, hundreds of thousands of people streamed into the sprawling, planned capital, founded in 1960 to house the Brazilian government, with many dressed in the bright red of Mr. Lula’s leftist Workers’ Party.

Over the weekend, passengers on arriving planes broke into rally songs about Mr. Lula, revelers danced to samba at New Year’s Eve parties and, across the city, spontaneous cries rang out from balconies and street corners, heralding Mr. Lula’s arrival and Mr. Bolsonaro’s exit.

“Lula’s inauguration is mainly about hope,” said Isabela Nascimento, 30, a software developer walking to the festivities on Sunday. “I hope to see him representing not only a political party, but an entire population — a whole group of people who just want to be happier.”

Yet elsewhere in the city, thousands of Mr. Bolsonaro’s supporters remained camped outside the army headquarters, as they have been since the election, many saying they were convinced that at the final moment on Sunday, the military would prevent Mr. Lula from taking office.

“The army has patriotism and love for the country, and in the past, the army did the same thing,” Magno Rodrigues, 60, a former mechanic and janitor who gives daily speeches at the protests, said on Saturday, referring to the 1964 military coup that ushered in the dictatorship.

Mr. Rodrigues has spent the past nine weeks sleeping in a tent on a narrow pad with his wife. He provided a tour of the encampment, which had become a small village since Mr. Bolsonaro lost the election. It has showers, a laundry service, cellphone-charging stations, a hospital and 28 food stalls.

The protests have been overwhelmingly nonviolent — with more praying than rioting — but a small group of people have set fire to vehicles. Mr. Lula’s transitional government had suggested that the encampments would not be tolerated for much longer.

How long was Mr. Rodrigues prepared to stay? “As long as it takes to liberate my country,” he said. “For the rest of my life if I have to.”

The absence of Mr. Bolsonaro and the presence of thousands of protesters who believe the election was stolen illustrate the deep divide and tall challenges that Mr. Lula faces in his third term as president of Latin America’s biggest country and one of the world’s largest democracies.

He oversaw a boom in Brazil from 2003 to 2011, but the country was not nearly as polarized then, and the economic tailwinds were far stronger. Mr. Lula’s election caps a leftist wave in Latin America, with six of the region’s seven largest countries electing leftist leaders since 2018, fueled by an anti-incumbent backlash.

Mr. Bolsonaro’s decision to spend at least the first weeks of Mr. Lula’s presidency in Florida shows his unease about his future in Brazil. Mr. Bolsonaro, 67, is linked to five separate inquiries, including one into his release of documents related to a classified investigation, another on his attacks on Brazil’s voting machines and another into his potential connections to “digital militias” that spread misinformation on his behalf.

As a regular citizen, Mr. Bolsonaro will now lose the prosecutorial immunity he had as president. Some cases against him will probably be moved to local courts from the Supreme Court.

Some top federal prosecutors who have worked on the cases believe there is enough evidence to convict Mr. Bolsonaro, particularly in the case related to the release of classified material, according to a top federal prosecutor who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss confidential investigations.

On Sunday, Mr. Lula told Congress that Mr. Bolsonaro could face consequences. “We have no intention of revenge against those who tried to subjugate the nation to their personal and ideological plans, but we will guarantee the rule of law,” he said. “Those who have done wrong will answer for their mistakes.”

It is unlikely that Mr. Bolsonaro’s presence in the United States could protect him from prosecution in Brazil. Still, Florida has become a sort of refuge for conservative Brazilians in recent years.

Prominent pundits on some of Brazil’s most popular talk shows are based in Florida. A far-right provocateur who faces arrest in Brazil for threatening judges has lived in Florida as he awaits a response to his political asylum request in the United States. And Carla Zambelli, one of Mr. Bolsonaro’s top allies in Brazil’s Congress, fled to Florida for nearly three weeks after she was filmed pursuing a man at gunpoint on the eve of the election.

Mr. Bolsonaro plans to stay in Florida for one to three months, giving him some distance to observe whether Mr. Lula’s administration will push any of the investigations against him, according to a close friend of the Bolsonaro family who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss private plans. The Brazilian government has also authorized four aides to spend a month in Florida with Mr. Bolsonaro, according to an official notice.

On Saturday, Mr. Bolsonaro greeted his new neighbors in the driveway of his rented Orlando house, many of them Brazilian immigrants who took selfies with the departing president. He then went to a KFC to eat.

It is not uncommon for former heads of state to live in the United States for posts in academia or similar ventures. But it is unusual for a head of state to seek safe haven in the United States from possible prosecution at home, particularly when the home country is a democratic U.S. ally.

Mr. Bolsonaro and his allies argue that he is a political target of Brazil’s left and particularly Brazil’s Supreme Court. They have largely dropped claims that the election was rigged because of voter fraud but instead now claim that it was unfair because Alexandre de Moraes, a Supreme Court justice who runs Brazil’s election agency, tipped the scales for Mr. Lula.

Mr. Moraes was an active player in the election, suspending the social-media accounts of many of Mr. Bolsonaro’s supporters and granting Mr. Lula more television time because of misleading statements in Mr. Bolsonaro’s political ads. Mr. Moraes has said he needed to act to counter the antidemocratic stances of Mr. Bolsonaro and his supporters. Some legal experts worry that he abused his power, often acting unilaterally in ways that go far beyond that of a typical Supreme Court judge.

Still, Mr. Bolsonaro has faced widespread criticism, on both the right and the left, for his response to his election loss. After suggesting for months he would dispute any loss — firing up his supporters and worrying his critics — he instead went silent, refusing to acknowledge Mr. Lula’s victory publicly. His administration carried out the transition as he receded from the spotlight and many of his official duties.

On Saturday night, in his departing speech to the nation, even his vice president, Hamilton Mourão, a former general, made clear his views on Mr. Bolsonaro’s final moments as president.

“Leaders that should reassure and unite the nation around a project for the country have let their silence or inopportune and harmful protagonism create a climate of chaos and social disintegration,” Mr. Mourão said.

nytimes.com

open the KFC link above - Last lunch as president

Photos: Huge crowds gather for Lula’s swearing-in ceremony https://www.aljazeera.com/gallery/20...ng-in-ceremony