Bolsonaro gets to work on agenda

Brazil President-elect moves to merge agriculture and environment ministries

Brazil’s far-right President-elect Jair Bolsonaro started rolling out key points in his hardline agenda on Tuesday, including a move to merge the agriculture and environment ministries that activists warned would imperil the Amazon rainforest.

The former army captain huddled with his inner circle at the home of a wealthy backer in Rio de Janeiro to start forming what adviser Gustavo Bebianno called “a combat vanguard” for the new administration.

But as Bolsonaro made plans for his government following his big election win, thousands of his opponents flooded one of Sao Paulo’s largest avenues, chanting “Not him, not ever!”

Protests

The protesters marched in the evening with a banner reading “Dictatorship, never again” — a reference to Bolsonaro’s outspoken admiration for the brutal military regime that ruled Brazil from 1964 to 1985.

In one of the incoming administration’s first major policy announcements, Bolsonaro’s pick for chief of staff, Onyx Lorenzoni, confirmed the agriculture and environment ministries would be combined.

The president-elect, who is backed by Brazil’s powerful agribusiness lobby, had floated the idea in the past, saying, “Let’s be clear: the future ministry will come from the productive sector. We won’t have any more fights over this.”

After activists warned the move would undermine the environment ministry’s controls on business, Bolsonaro, 63, had struck a more conciliatory tone in the final days of the campaign, saying he was “open to negotiation on that issue.”

His quick reversal will likely raise fears he will stick to his hardline conservative stance on other issues, too, after dialling back his vitriolic and derogatory rhetoric in the campaign’s final stretch.