Monday, January 2, 2023 | 1:30 p.m.
Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, 77, assumed the presidency of Brazil for a four-year term yesterday, when he was sworn in at the National Congress, accompanied by a crowd of 300,000 people at the Esplanade of the Ministries, in the capital Brasilia.
The Brazilian president assumed his third term after having governed the country between 2003 and 2010 and after having been illegally imprisoned for 580 days as part of Operation Lavajato, which is why he was unable to participate in the 2018 elections expired by the outgoing president, Jair Bolsonaro, who left the country on Friday when traveling to the United States.
The new president of Brazil assured that “the process of national destruction” left behind by his predecessor Jair Bolsonaro, during his inauguration speech before Congress, is over.
Lula promised to create a national “reconstruction” government and denounced the hollowing out of public policies caused during the administration of the far-right Bolsonaro.
The president said that he intends to “build democracy” in his country “on solid foundations.”
In this sense, he announced that he is going to meet with all the governors of the Brazilian states “to define priorities”, “structure a new pact to generate jobs” and “seek resources” to finance these changes.
In several sections of his speech, he lashed out at the “denialist” and “obscurantist” government that the far-right Jair Bolsonaro had until yesterday.
“I said that the mission of my life would be fulfilled when every Brazilian could eat three meals a day. Having to repeat this commitment today is the most serious symptom of the devastation that has been imposed on the country in recent years,” he lamented.
Foreign policy
The Brazilian president announced that his government will reinforce its foreign policy based on Latin American integration in Mercosur, Unasur and the Brics group, in addition to maintaining an “active and haughty” dialogue with the United States, China and the European Union (EU). .
“We must break the isolation to which the country was subjected. We must be the owners of our destiny,” said Lula, who also promised to activate public banks to strengthen the internal consumer market and use the Budget for a new era of industrialization of the greatest economy of Latin America.
Da Silva arrived at the Brazilian Congress some 20 minutes early for the inauguration ceremony to become Brazil’s president for the third time, after being received with military honors by the head of the Chamber of Deputies, Arthur Lira, and the head of the Senate, Rodrigo Pacheco. .
Local authorities and foreign visitors were present at the ceremony, including former President Dilma Rousseff, of the Workers’ Party (PT), dismissed in 2016 by Congress.
The ceremony began after 2:30 p.m., when the still president-elect went up in front of the Metropolitan Cathedral in a convertible Rolls Royce belonging to the Presidency of the Republic that would take him to Congress, where he was sworn in, over a distance of 1,400 meters.
Lula got into the car accompanied by his wife, Rosángela da Silva, Janja. But before starting the march, he asked Vice President Geraldo Alckmin and his wife, Lu Alchkmin, to get into the convertible vehicle, the use of which was in doubt until hours before this inauguration ceremony for security reasons.
Lula da Silva’s gesture to his running mate was a sign of the president’s intention to comply with the agreement he forged with Alckmin, a center-right politician, when he told him that his role would not be that of a vice president, but both They would run the country together.
At the beginning of his third presidential term, Lula recalled his first term as president of Brazil. “In 2003, in this very square, we made the commitment to recover the destiny of the Brazilian people, to improve people’s living conditions. The commitment was to fight against inequality and poverty. We ended hunger and misery, but today, 20 years later, we returned to that past,” he denounced. “Inequality and poverty have returned, they are back and it is a crime, the most severe against the Brazilian people. Hunger is the daughter of inequality,” he said.
Cabinet with women’s record
The government of Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva that began yesterday has 37 ministries, of which 11 will be led by women, a record number, but in the cabinet, with representatives of nine parties, there will also be the search for the correlation of forces that the Executive Branch will need to achieve majorities for its projects in Congress.
With Lula, the coalition presidentialism that had been presumed dead with Operation Lava Jato and the rise of Jair Bolsonaro in 2018 returned, especially since the real discussion will be how the partner parties in the Executive Power will respond in the necessary votes in the Congress.
Lula promised to “make again a Brazil of all and for all”
