Bolsonaro keeps Brazil guessing – what will he do if he loses?
Brazil’s bombastic right-wing president has said he will have ‘‘nothing more to do on Earth’’ if he loses the country’s election next month.
President Jair Bolsonaro, speaking on a podcast, adopted a notably downbeat tone in a week in which all polls have put him well behind his left-wing rival, a fortnight before the first-round vote.
The latest survey, by Quaest, showed the incumbent on 34% and Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, the former president, on 42% – a slight narrowing of the gap from the previous week’s poll. If neither candidate receives more than 50% of the vote on October 2, a run-off will be held on October 30.
Bolsonaro, a maverick former army captain who once said Brazil would ‘‘change only on the day that we break out in civil war’’, has often hinted in the past year that he will not accept the result if he loses, claiming, without evidence, that the country’s electronic voting system is unreliable.
He has also characterised his opponent Lula, who was jailed in 2018 for corruption and spent 580 days in prison before the charges were annulled, of being hellbent on ‘‘destroying Brazil’’.
That made Bolsonaro’s seemingly defeatist comments particularly striking. For the first time since the campaign began, he seemed to contemplate political retirement.
‘‘If it is God’s will, I will continue. If not, we’ll pass on the presidential sash, and I’ll retire,’’ he said. He has previously said his post-election options were ‘‘victory, prison or death’’.
Some have argued that the conciliatory comments were calculated to shore up support beyond his core base in order to get over the crucial first-round hurdle. ‘‘It seems to me all part of the act. He needs to reach out to moderate voters like never before’’, Guilherme Casaroes, a professor of political science at Fundacao Getulio Vargas in Sao Paulo, said.
There have been other signs in recent days that Bolsonaro, 67, who is notorious for outrageous comments, has been reminded that appearing conventional can also be a vote-winner. It was only last week that he boasted to thousands of supporters about his enduring virility with his wife, who is 27 years younger than him.
He was one of the first world leaders to confirm that he would attend the Queen’s funeral, which means an overseas trip in the runup to the election. Some have suggested that his enthusiasm was in part driven by a desire to appear statesmanlike. One of his assistants was heard gloating that his rival Lula would, in contrast, be ‘‘left out’’.
But doubts remain as to whether Bolsonaro will concede defeat, should he lose to an opponent he has long labelled a criminal and a communist. Brian Winter, the editor-in-chief of Americas Quarterly, wrote this month: ‘‘I do not believe that President Jair Bolsonaro will ever willingly hand over power to his rival in this October’s election,
Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva. If Lula wins, as polls currently suggest he will, there will be an institutional crisis in Brazil.’’
The precise nature of that crisis has been the subject of fevered debate in recent months. A traditional coup is seen as unlikely. Brazil was under military rule from 1964 to 1985, a period Bolsonaro has portrayed as a golden age. But there is no evidence that senior army commanders support directly intervening to keep the president in office. When Bolsonaro sought to turn the September 7 independence day parade into a massive show of military strength, with him in command, the army quietly scaled back its plans.
‘‘Coup d’etats have happened in Brazil only when there are three conditions in place – when there is ample support from the economic elite, from big media and from the United States of America,’’ Celso Amorim, 80, who has served as the country’s defence minister and foreign minister, said. ‘‘I don’t think he has any of the three.’’
Amorim suspects that Bolsonaro may be hoping to create what he described as ‘‘confusion’’ – perhaps calling his supporters on to the streets. An intervention from the security forces could follow before the country entered what he described as ‘‘unknown territory’’. If beaten next month, Bolsonaro might surprise everyone and quietly retire.
But of all the scenarios Brazil faces in the coming weeks, that appears to be the least likely.