Former President Lula da Silva, now a candidate to return to office, this Monday in São Paulo during the appearance before the foreign press.MIGUEL SCHINCARIOL (AFP)
Creating jobs, protecting the Amazon, promoting social inclusion and Brazilian diplomacy will be the pillars of Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva's policy if he wins the elections in October and returns to power for a third term, as the polls predict.
Now that the campaign has officially started, the former president outlined his plans on Monday during an appearance before the international press in São Paulo.
Lula has promised that, if he becomes president, he will promote a major public works plan to create jobs and put an end to illegal mining in the Amazon.
Favorite in the polls, the leftist has declared himself convinced that the president, Jair Bolsonaro, will abide by the result.
Lula leads the polls with a comfortable lead (18 points), but shrinking.
The leftist's recipes to "fix Brazil," as he often says, are reissues of the policies he applied between 2003 and 2010. Lula has been insisting for months that, with him, Brazilians were happier and lived better than they are now.
President Bolsonaro will open this round of interviews with the candidates in the main nightly news program on Brazilian television,
Jornal Nacional
.
There are 41 days left for an election between the two most loved and hated political leaders in Brazil, an election very bitter due to the bellicosity shown by Bolsonarism, the fear of violent attacks and the speed at which misinformation and false news circulate.
Brazil also comes to these elections with a limping economy, but one that is beginning to show some positive sign, and 33 million people who suffer from hunger (16% of the population).
In the event of victory, "we are going to generate a lot of employment," Lula has promised, detailing that his government would give "the kick-off with a large investment in public works" to which he would like private initiative to join.
The leftist candidate, who presided over Brazil during boom years, wanted to play down the current situation by recalling the scenario of 2003, when he was inaugurated as president: “For me it is not new to receive Brazil with high inflation, then I was in 12 %, or with high rates, they were at 24%”.
Now the price rise is almost 12% and the price of money is 13.75%.
He affirms that the task is enormous because the weight of the industry, which offered quality employment, is no longer what it was.
To lubricate her relations with the economic power, Lula is running former governor Geraldo Alckmin as his vice-presidential candidate, a symbol of the center-right that Bolsonaro struck down at the polls four years ago.
If elected, Lula would like to tweak the trade agreement between Mercosur and the European Union, already agreed but not ratified.
He has also promised to raise the minimum wage "because it is the best way for the economy to grow" and that he will not privatize any public company.
He has made it clear that he is against the spending ceiling, but he has added that he will exercise fiscal responsibility: "A serious State cannot spend more than it has."
The PT candidate has been very concerned about fake news.
In recent days, Bolsonarism has mobilized to broadcast edited clips of his public interventions to show him as a candidate who defends beating women, intends to close evangelical temples or drinks excessively.
One of the great fears generated by these elections is the reaction of the president and his most radical supporters in the face of a hypothetical defeat.
Bolsonaro has stopped criticizing the voting system and on Saturday said that if he loses, he will accept it: “I am on this mission to be re-elected, if that is what happens.
Otherwise, I respect it."
For Lula, the far-right "is a bad copy of Trump", but he added: "I am certain that the electoral result will be accepted", also referring to Bolsonaro.
And the environment has occupied a good part of the brief introduction that he has made before answering questions from foreign media for more than an hour.
Lula has promised to place the issue among the priorities of a possible government — "we will take care of the climate issue like never before" — and to end illegal mining, in contrast to Bolsonaro, who defends it and would like to authorize the exploitation of indigenous lands.
For Lula, “if the world is willing to help, keeping a tree standing in the Amazon can be better than any other investment”.
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