Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva will oversee a more divided Brazil
Protests by supporters of Jair Bolsonaro are just the beginning
In his victory speech on October 30th, after a white-knuckle election, Brazil’s president-elect, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, confessed that he was “half happy and half worried”. Avenida Paulista, a buzzy street dominated in recent years by rallies in favour of Jair Bolsonaro, the far-right populist president, was awash in the red of the Workers’ Party, founded by Lula (as he is known). But the result was the narrowest since Brazil’s return to democracy in the 1980s: 50.9% to 49.1%, or just 2.1m votes.
As Lula spoke, bolsonarista lorry drivers had already begun blocking roads throughout the country, burning tyres and calling for military intervention to prevent him from taking office. By the end of October 31st there were more than 300 roadblocks, across most of the 26 states and the federal district of Brasília. The highway police delayed obeying court orders to break them up, but eventually started doing so.
This article appeared in the The Americas section of the print edition under the headline "Hallelula"
From the November 5th 2022 edition
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