Current:Home > NewsBrazil’s Lula seeks to project unity and bring the army in line during Independence Day events -OceanicInvest
Brazil’s Lula seeks to project unity and bring the army in line during Independence Day events
View
Date:2025-04-16 15:16:53
RIO DE JANEIRO (AP) — Brazil’s President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva sought to project national unity Thursday during Independence Day events that included a military parade in the capital, just eight months after his predecessor’s supporters launched an uprising hoping to prompt the army to oust Lula from power.
Under the slogan “Democracy, Sovereignty and Unity,” the commemorations marked a stark contrast with those organized under former President Jair Bolsonaro, who used such events to boost his reelection campaign and to slam Brazil’s Supreme Court, threatening to plunge the country into a constitutional crisis.
Lula’s administration aimed to show a united front with the country’s military, political analysts say, as the nation recovers from Jan. 8 riots when Bolsonaro supporters ransacked the Supreme Court and Congress, and asked for a military intervention to keep their leader in power.
During a ceremony in the capital, Brasilia, Lula appeared next to Rosa Weber, head of the Supreme Court, and Senate leader Rodrigo Pacheco. Crowds in Brasilia, Sao Paulo and Rio de Janeiro were smaller than in recent years under the Bolsonaro administration, when tens of thousands of people showed up wearing yellow and green, the colors of the Brazilian flag.
On its homepage Thursday, newspaper O Globo said this year’s events marked “a return to normalcy.”
In a recorded address aired Wednesday, Lula had called for Brazilians of different faiths, football teams and political stripes to celebrate together the 201th anniversary of Brazil’s Independence. “Tomorrow will be neither hate nor fear, but union,” the leftist president said.
“The previous government tried to appropriate these celebrations, the armed forces, for personal purposes,” said Carolina Botelho, a political scientist at the University of Sao Paulo’s Advanced Studies Institute. “The message is not only to unify, but to rescue a state institution for society.”
During his four years in office from 2019 to 2022, Bolsonaro, a former army captain, had stacked his administration with military officers and repeatedly sought their support, including t o cast doubt on the reliability of the nation’s electronic voting system.
Investigations targeting Bolsonaro and some of his closest allies already have ensnared some members of the military community. Lt. Col. Mauro Cid, Bolsonaro’s former right-hand man, has been in detention since May and federal police searched the house of his father, Gen. Mauro César Lourena Cid.
According to one of the investigations, the younger Cid sold a Rolex and a Patek Philippe watch given as a gift to Bolsonaro by the government of Saudi Arabia in 2019. The money was allegedly transferred to the bank account of Cid’s father the same day. Cid is also under investigation for allegedly falsifying COVID-19 vaccine cards for his own family and Bolsonaro’s family during the pandemic in order to allow them to travel.
In an effort to diminish the role of military members in his government, Lula has tapped civilians to replace military officers, and moved oversight of the country’s intelligence agency to his chief of staff’s office.
On Sept. 7, 2021, Bolsonaro had slammed the Supreme Court, claiming he would no longer abide by rulings from Justice Alexandre de Moraes for making what the former leader characterized as political arrests. Attending demonstrations where his supporters displayed anti-democratic banners requesting military intervention, Bolsonaro had said: “Only God removes me.”
A year later, then a candidate for re-election, Bolsonaro transformed the nation’s bicentennial event into a multi-city campaign event.
“What we want to do now, with the participation of the army, the navy and air force, is to go back to making September 7th for everyone,” Lula said Tuesday during a weekly address to the nation. “The 7th of September belongs to the military, the teacher, the doctor, the dentist, the lawyer, the hot dog vendor, the small and medium individual entrepreneur.”
veryGood! (9543)
Related
- EU countries double down on a halt to Syrian asylum claims but will not yet send people back
- Mega Millions winning numbers for April 5 drawing; jackpot climbs to $67 million
- USWNT advances to SheBelieves Cup final after beating Japan in Columbus
- Forgot to get solar eclipse glasses? Here's how to DIY a viewer with household items.
- The city of Chicago is ordered to pay nearly $80M for a police chase that killed a 10
- Elephant attack leaves American woman dead in Zambia's Kafue National Park
- A 4.8 magnitude earthquake shook the East Coast. When was the last quake in New Jersey, NYC?
- WrestleMania 40 winners, highlights from night one: The Rock returns and much more
- How to watch the 'Blue Bloods' Season 14 finale: Final episode premiere date, cast
- SWAT team responding to Arkansas shopping mall, police ask public to avoid the area
Ranking
- Senate begins final push to expand Social Security benefits for millions of people
- New York City to pay $17.5 million to settle suit over forcing women to remove hijabs for mug shots
- Sonequa Martin-Green bids farewell to historic role on Star Trek: Discovery
- The Top 33 Amazon Deals Right Now: 42 Pairs of Earrings for $14, $7 Dresses, 30% Off Waterpik, and More
- Gen. Mark Milley's security detail and security clearance revoked, Pentagon says
- A spill of firefighting foam has been detected in three West Virginia waterways
- Body of third construction worker recovered from Key Bridge wreckage in Baltimore
- New Mexico lawmaker receives $30,000 settlement from injuries in door incident at state Capitol
Recommendation
Military service academies see drop in reported sexual assaults after alarming surge
What Final Four games are today? Breaking down the NCAA Tournament semifinals of March Madness
The solar eclipse could deliver a $6 billion economic boom: The whole community is sold out
Teen Moms Maci Bookout Reveals Where Her Co-Parenting Relationship With Ryan Edwards Stands Now
Meta releases AI model to enhance Metaverse experience
Joe Brennan, Democratic former governor of Maine and US congressman, dies at 89
The Top 33 Amazon Deals Right Now: 42 Pairs of Earrings for $14, $7 Dresses, 30% Off Waterpik, and More
2 dead, 7 injured, including police officer, in shooting at Miami martini bar