Disgusted by his defeat against Lula, whom he considers “unfair”, and totally depressed at not having been re-elected, Jair Bolsonaro is back in Brazil this Thursday. The former president, who had gone into exile for three months in the United States, is determined to return to politics. At 68, the far-right ex-president wants to play a role in opposing his left-wing successor Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva and believes in his chances of returning to power.
This “corona-skeptic” refused to get vaccinated and joked about vaccines, which can turn people into “crocodiles” or “bearded women”. A parliamentary commission of inquiry called for his indictment for “crimes against humanity”.
It was with the same defiance that he faced the approximately 150 impeachment requests filed in Parliament. Elected to “restore order”, Jair Bolsonaro often ruled with his chin, at the head of a cabinet shaken by dismissals or resignations. But, at the very end of his mandate, his economic results were rather positive.
A fervent patriot and defender of his country’s sovereignty, he criticized and even insulted several foreign heads of state or government, isolating Brazil on the international scene. The most violent controversy had opposed him to French President Emmanuel Macron in 2019 while the Amazon was on fire, where deforestation broke records under his mandate.