Ex-Brazil leader Lula ends standoff, turns himself in
SAO PAULO, Brazil — Former Brazilian president Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, long hailed as a standard-bearer of the global left, ended a dramatic two-day standoff with authorities on Saturday, turning himself in to face a 12-year sentence on corruption charges. He has vowed to stage his political comeback from prison.
The move intensified the roiling political drama in Latin America’s largest nation and turned a man former President Barack Obama once called “the most popular politician on Earth” into the region’s most famous prisoner.
His jailing underscores the scope of the corruption probe known as Operation Car Wash that is bringing down political and business leaders across Latin America. Lula is by far the biggest figure yet to fall.
Lula waded through crowds of supporters and surrendered to authorities Saturday evening after a tense impasse in which he avoided prison and hunkered down in the steelmakers union where he launched his career four decades ago.
His backers, linked arm in arm in a human chain, tried to prevent his exit, even as a motorcade of police streamed toward the union building outside Sao Paulo.
“I will comply with the order,” Lula told hundreds of supporters surrounding the union earlier in the day. Later, he was carried off the stage at the headquarters on their shoulders as they chanted his name and showered him with flowers. “That way, they will know I am not afraid. I am not running. I will prove my innocence.”
Lula has vowed to run for re-election from prison, which in his case will be a private, 160-squarefoot room with unfettered access to lawyers and family members in the southern city of Curitiba. But Brazilian law will likely disqualify him from running.
His legal troubles have left Brazil’s October presidential race — in which he was the front-runner — wide open, with analysts saying there is now room for out-of-the-box candidates, including a deeply religious conservative decried by the left for his stance on women, gays and lesbians.
While Lula is expected to anoint an alternate to replace him in the elections, his popularity is unlikely to transfer to another candidate. Onethird of Brazilians are expected to cast blank protest votes, according to the latest polls.