The predicament in which former Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro finds himself in after Brazil’s election judges banned him from running for public office for the next eight years is largely of his own making. Having patterned himself on his idol, former American President Donald Trump, and having wielded power with a similar casual disdain for institutions, Mr Bolsonaro has been held guilty of abusing his powers and of spouting “immoral” and “appalling lies” during last year’s election.

The decision was based on his decision last July to summon foreign ambassadors to his residence and tell them that Brazil’s electronic voting system was deeply flawed, and to thus spread politically motivated disinformation as one of the five judges who ruled against him put it. Accused of making his country appear to the world as “a little banana republic”, Mr. Bolsonaro will now be eligible for public office only in 2030, by when he would have turned 75. Another of the judges accused the former President of having told “appalling lies” and of having indulged in a “deceitful monologue” with a view to “arouse a state of collective paranoia” among voters. In the build-up to the election,

Advertisement

Mr. Bolsonaro had repeatedly said he would reject the result if he thought the vote was unfair; the harangue on what he termed faulty electronic voting machines and a flawed electoral process led, after he had lost the election, to his supporters attacking government buildings in a bid to overturn the result. Federal investigators have found considerable evidence to show that Mr. Bolsonaro and his supporters had drawn up elaborate plans to overthrow Mr.

Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, the man who won the election, through the intervention of the military. The ruling of the election court may well mark the end of the controversial Mr. Bolsonaro’s political career, at least for the foreseeable future, but it leaves important questions unanswered. While Mr. Lula won the election, the margin of victory was small. Thus while Mr. Lula won a little over 60 million votes, Mr. Bolsonaro had the support of 58 million Brazilians who endorsed his right-of-centre policies. This large constituency of Brazilians will need a leader, one who can match Mr. Bolsonaro’s charisma in translating their vision of how the country should be administered. While there are several contenders, including members of the former President’s family, it is clear Mr. Bolsonaro’s preference will be for a person amenable to his instruction for it is clear that he has several challenges ahead, not the least of which are prosecutions for orchestrating the attacks on institutions in January, faking coronavirus certificates and an attempt to appropriate expensive jewellery gifted officially by Saudi Arabia.

Mr. Bolsonaro has reacted to the decision with characteristic bravado, comparing it to an attempt to assassinate him in 2018. He said that he had then been stabbed in the belly, while “today I was stabbed in the back.”