Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro has had happier days: his polls have plummeted, his nemesis Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva is coming and the Senate is investigating his chaotic Covid-19.
What can I do?
First, ride your faithful blue and lead a massive group of far-right cyclists, just like you did last Sunday.
Second, a horse to release a demonstration of conservative farmers, as he intends to do on Saturday.
The organizers of the rally called on conservative “soldiers” to protest the “madness” of household stay measures in the event of a pandemic and Brazil’s Supreme Court, which allowed local government to impose such policies despite Bolsonaro’s objections.
Thirdly, “Christian marches for the freedom of the circle of relatives” are also planned in about a hundred locations this weekend, evoking a movement similar to that of the 1964 coup that installed a 21-year-old military dictatorship in Brazil, for which Bolsonaro, a former army captain, is unac brazenly nostalgic.
Faced with threats on several fronts, the guy nicknamed the “Trump Tropical” has devised a familiar scenario: energizing his base with gigantic polarizing rallies that tend to offend critics as intensely as die-hard fans.
The question is whether it functions as a political strategy, before embarking on a complicated re-election crusade next year.
“It’s going on for a while. So she plays at its core,” said Debora Messenberg, a sociologist at the University of Brasilia.
“Bolsonaro, like all far-right politicians, will have to keep his main supporters on a war footing. Far-right leaders live for war,” he told the AFP.
– Pandemic probe –
Bolsonaro turns out to be vulnerable to pandemic.
The Senate opened an investigation last month into the handling of the Covid-19 government, which killed another 430,000 people in Brazil, in the United States alone.
Bolsonaro called Thursday’s investigation a “crime” and “other good people under investigation through villains. “
Broadcast live, audiences highlight the administration’s pandemic policies, which come with attacking blockades, selling the useless drug chloroquine, and rejecting now-essential vaccine offerings.
“It’s like a parade of other people who remind Brazilians why the death toll is so high,” said Brian Winter, vice president of the Society of the Americas/Council of the Americas.
“He loves the 2022 race, because it will remind him of the deastrous control and denial he has embarked on. “
Then there is the return of former President Lula, who regained the right to run when the Supreme Court oversteorated his convictions for corruption in March.
This established a possible election in October 2022 between Bolsonaro, 66, and the leftist of 75 years (2003-2010).
The latest survey, published Wednesday through the Datafolha corporation, provides Lula with 55% of the vote versus 32% of Bolsonaro in a hypothetical run-off.
Worse for the outgoing far-right president: his long-unwavering approval rate at least 30%, reached an all-time low of 24%.
– Following Trump? –
This is one more explanation of why Bolsonaro gathers its base, the fervor of which turns out to be diminishing a little.
“The base still supports him, however, they are a little disappointed and out of their minds for reasons,” Winter said.
These come with the recent dismissal of ultra-conservative foreign minister Ernesto Araujo and Bolsonaro’s new pragmatic alliance with the “Centrao”, a tough organization of pig-hungry parties hated by the electorate eager to “drain the swamp” in Brasilia.
But a challenge for Bolsonaro, revitalizing its base also risks further alienating average elegance and the business sector, which voted overwhelmingly for it in 2018 but are disenchanted.
If all else fails, Bolsonaro is in a position to take a page from Donald Trump’s reading book.
Like the former president of the United States, his political model, Bolsonaro criticized the integrity of the upcoming elections, attacking evidence of Brazil’s electronic voting formula.
“You’ve already made it clear that you’ll run if you lose,” Andre Rehbein Sathler said of the Congresso em Foco news website.
“He’s obviously following Trump’s stage. “
Bolsonaro is accused of threatening Brazil’s democratic institutions.
He boasts of the help of his “army”, and the intransigent in each and every rallies urge the army to organize an intervention to give it the strength to rule by decree.