Bolsonaro denies plotting coup

SHOW OF SUPPORT: FOLLOWERS PROTEST AGAINST PROBE

➽ Former leader reiterates he is being persecuted after his term in office.

Thousands of Brazilians poured into the streets of Sao Paulo on Sunday as ex-president Jair Bolsonaro flexed his political muscle and hit out at an election ban that has seen him barred from seeking office for eight years.

Addressing a massive crowd of supporters in the economic capital, Bolsonaro again denied charges that he plotted a coup to stay in power after losing an election in October 2022.

“What is a coup? Tanks in the streets, weapons, conspiracy. None of that happened in Brazil,” said Bolsonaro, who has had his passport seized by police as he and his inner circle are investigated.

In June, the electoral tribunal barred Bolsonaro from running for office until 2030 over his attacks on the election system.

Bolsonaro also called for “an amnesty for those poor wretched souls who are imprisoned in Brasilia” after the invasion of the presidential palace, Congress and Supreme Court in January 2023 by his followers, who demanded the military intervene in what they said had been a stolen election.

The 68-year-old former army officer called Sunday’s protest for a show of support as his legal woes pile up a little over a year since he left office after losing a deeply divisive election to President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva.

Dressed in the green and yellow of Brazil’s flag, which Bolsonaro claimed as a symbol while in office, his supporters thronged Paulista Avenue, one of the main arteries in the country’s economic capital.

The former leader reiterated that he was being “persecuted” after his 2019-2022 rule.

Gleisi Hoffmann, the president of Lula’s Workers’ Party (PT), wrote on X that the rally was “one more threat from Bolsonaro to the institutions and a challenge to the judiciary, to which he is close to having to be held accountable.”

Nevertheless, Bolsonaro is still considered the leader of the opposition and is adored by his fervent supporters.

“Bolsonaro is an honest person, a victim of persecution,” said 63-year-old builder Wilson Aseka, who travelled 700 kilometres from the state of Minas Gerais to attend the protest.

The protest on Sunday afternoon is seen as a litmus test of his support ahead of October municipal elections, in which his influence is expected to play a key role in the still-polarised nation. –