Lula enters the history of redemocratization with 3rd term

President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva (PT), 77 years old, begins this Sunday (1st) his third term as President of the Republic. Consecrated again at the polls, with more than 60 million votes received on October 30, it expands its historical role over the last three decades, which marked the redemocratization of the country after 21 years of dictatorship (1964-1985). Lula dedicated the last two months to setting up a broad coalition government, more comprehensive than in his previous terms. The greatest expression of this is the partnership with Geraldo Alckmin (PSB), who was his political opponent in the 2006 elections, still affiliated with the PSDB, a historic rival of the PT, but who joined Lula to compose a broad front plate of center- left, which included center-right political groups in the second round. Even before taking office, the challenge of this broad front has already been put to the test. The elected government team needed to sew a difficult articulation in the National Congress to approve a proposal for a constitutional amendment (PEC) that would guarantee resources for the main campaign promise: the maintenance of the value of the Bolsa Família program at R$ 600, plus R$ 150 per child up to six years old of each beneficiary of the program. After more than 20 days of processing, the PEC passed in two shifts both in the Chamber of Deputies and in the Federal Senate. The text also released extra funds for the budget recomposition of several bodies. Another challenge of the last few weeks was the very assembly of the first echelon of government. Evoking the structure of his second term as president, between 2007 and 2010, Lula decided to expand the number of ministries, reaching 37. Among the recreated ministries and new structures are the ministries of Women, Racial Equality, Human Rights and of Indigenous Peoples, the latter a novelty and campaign promise. The Ministry of Economy, which concentrated super powers during the term of Jair Bolsonaro, was again dismembered into ministries of Finance, Development, Industry and Commerce and Planning, in addition to a new portfolio of Management and Innovation in Public Services. The ministries of Culture and Sport were also recreated. In the area of ​​infrastructure, the government recreated the ministries of Cities, Ports and Airports, Transport and Integration and Regional Development. From the union to the Presidency Lula has a long trajectory in Brazilian politics, starting in the 1970s. one of the main industrial centers of the country. In 1975, he was elected president of the union, which represented 100,000 workers. Three years later, in 1978, after being re-elected president of the entity, Lula led the first workers’ strikes in more than a decade. At that time, the country was experiencing a process of slow and gradual political opening. In March 1979, more than 170 thousand metallurgists stopped the factories in ABC Paulista. The following year, around 200,000 metallurgists withdrew. Police repression of the strike movement, which even landed Lula in prison, gave rise to Lula’s popular leadership, which would create the Workers’ Party (PT) in 1980. A few years later, he would also found the Central Única dos Trabalhadores (CUT). ). In 1984, Lula was one of the main leaders of the Diretas Já campaign for the Presidency of the Republic. In 1986, he was elected the most voted federal deputy in the country, for the Constituent Assembly, which elaborated the Federal Constitution of 1988. Consolidated national leadership, Lula was launched by the PT to run for the Presidency of the Republic in 1989, after 29 years without direct election for the charge. He lost the dispute, in the second round, to Fernando Collor de Mello, by a small difference in votes. Two years later, however, Lula led a national mobilization against corruption that culminated in Collor’s impeachment. In 1994 and 1998, Lula was again a candidate for president, being defeated by Fernando Henrique Cardoso on both occasions. In 2002, through an unprecedented political alliance, the PT approved a political coalition that included PL, PCdoB, PCB and PMN, launching Lula again as president, with Senator José Alencar (PL), from Minas Gerais, as vice-president on the ticket. Gerais, one of the biggest businessmen in the country. On October 27, 2002, in the second round, at the age of 57, Lula obtained almost 53 million votes and was elected President of the Republic for the first time. His mandate was marked by the expansion of social programs and expansion in the areas of education and health, in addition to a policy to value the minimum wage. One of the main marks of his government was the reduction of extreme poverty in the country. In 2006, Lula and José Alencar are re-elected and end their term in 2010 with the highest approval of a government in the history of the country, over 80%. This popularity boosted the election of Dilma Rousseff (PT), who was Lula’s main minister, and was elected the first woman president in the country’s history. Lava Jato and prison In 2014, after the outbreak of Operation Lava Jato, which investigated corruption at Petrobras, the political crisis escalated to an unprecedented level in Brazilian democracy. Re-elected in the same year, President Dilma and her government ended up consumed by the wear and tear of the allegations, she lost support in Congress and ended up being impeached in 2016. Dilma’s removal is controversial, since the commission of a crime of responsibility was not demonstrated, as required by the Federal Constitution. Lula became the target of lawsuits for alleged corruption and was convicted by the then judge Sergio Moro, of the 13th Federal Court of Curitiba, where the operation processes were being processed. After being convicted in the Guarujá triplex process, the former president was arrested on April 7, 2018, two days after the issue of the arrest warrant against him. The magistrate’s sentence had been confirmed, and the sentence had been increased by the 8th Panel of the Federal Regional Court of the 4th Region, based in Porto Alegre. At the time, the Federal Supreme Court (STF) had changed the understanding that convicts in second instance could start serving their sentence. Lula spent 580 days in prison and was banned by the courts from running in the 2018 presidential elections, won by Jair Bolsonaro. The former president was released in November 2019, after the STF reviewed the thesis of compliance based on conviction in the second instance, starting to consider the possibility only with the final and unappealable decision of the process. In 2021, STF judgments considered that the then judge Sergio Moro was partial in Lula’s judgment, and the magistrate’s suspicion was declared, in the case of the triplex. The judgment was overturned. In addition, the cases of the Atibaia site and two criminal actions involving the Lula Institute were also annulled because they should have been judged by the Federal Court, in Brasília, and not in Curitiba, where Moro acted as a judge. In the Federal Court of the Federal District, the cases were considered expired, which is when the state misses the deadline to seek a conviction.

Agência Brasil