Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro this Wednesday EVARISTO SA / AFP
The president of Brazil, Jair Bolsonaro, suffered one of the most important political defeats of his term in Congress on Tuesday.
The far right has been repeating unfounded accusations of electoral fraud for months.
His proposal for a constitutional amendment to change the voting system fell to 79 votes of those necessary in a parliamentary session held hours after the president and captain in the reserve presided, along with the military leadership, an unprecedented parade of tanks in the downtown Brasilia.
Despite the parliamentary defeat, the controversy is still alive.
Bolsonaro insisted this Wednesday that "the result of the scrutiny (of the presidential elections) cannot be trusted."
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Jair Bolsonaro celebrates an unprecedented 10-minute military parade in Brasilia
It was the first time since the end of the dictatorship that a military convoy paraded on the sidelines of historical commemorations through the Plaza de los Tres Poderes, an immense space that houses the headquarters of the Presidency, the Supreme Court and Congress.
"Tanks in the street, exactly on the day of the vote of the PEC (proposed constitutional amendment) of the printed vote, it went from symbolism to actual, clear, undue and unconstitutional intimidation," tweeted centrist senator Simone Tebet.
Tanks on the road, exactly not the day of the PEC voting of the printed vote, passing from symbolism to intimidation, real, clear, undetermined, unconstitutional.
It will happen, it is only possible for CD to rejecte to PEC, it is a clear and objective answer that we live in a democracy and that we will remain.
- Simone Tebet (@SimoneTebetms) August 9, 2021
The electronic ballot box with which Brazil has been voting for 25 years was considered a national pride, but the controversy created by the president has become the nightmare of the opposition and of the authorities who reject the Bolsonarist conspiracy theories. The far-rightist has placed the voting system at the center of the political debate by systematically questioning it and demanding that the voter receive a printed receipt of their vote. It does so without showing evidence and with the argument that the system is not reliable despite the fact that in all these years not a single fraud has been confirmed. It is the typical diversionary maneuver of the populist script that contributes to generating confusion and eroding trust in democratic institutions, the Bolsonaro method.
The proposal on the printed vote reached the plenary session despite having been defeated in committee last week because the president of the Chamber of Deputies, Arthur Lira, wanted a resounding defeat to force the president to abandon the controversy.
But when push came to shove, as is often the case in Brazil, the results were far more diffuse.
Dozens of deputies were absent from the vote so that the proposal sponsored by Bolsonaro was far from being approved, but the difference between yes and no was only 11 votes, proportionally much lower than that registered in committee.
And in any case, the president remains stubborn on an issue that serves to keep the ranks tight among his followers.
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