Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva

Lula da Silva     (politician, trade union leader)
Born	Luiz Inácio da Silva 27 October 1945
Nationality	Brazilian
Party	Workers' Party
President-elect of Brazil In office 30 October 2022 - 31 December 2022  President of Brazil In office 1 January 2003 - 31 December 2010 Preceded by Fernando Henrique Cardoso Succeeded by Dilma Rousseff

Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva (known as Lula da Silva) is a Brazilian politician and trade unionist. Having previously been 35th President of Brazil from 2003 to 2010, Lula da Silva is the current President-elect of Brazil, and is expected to be inaugurated as the 39th President on 1 January 2023.

Lula da Silva was a founding member of the left-wing Workers' Party (PT) and ran unsuccessfully for president four times before achieving victory in the 2002 Brazilian general election. He was re-elected in 2006.

In May 2021, Lula stated that he would run for a third term in the 2022 Brazilian general election, against the incumbent president Jair Bolsonaro. He was elected president on 30 October 2022, defeating Bolsonaro in a close race. He is the first person to be democratically elected as President of Brazil three times, and the second to be elected to non-consecutive presidential terms (after Getúlio Vargas).

President-elect

With 99.97% of votes counted, Lula da Silva, a former factory worker who became Brazil’s first working-class president exactly 20 years ago, had secured 50.9% of the vote. Jair Bolsonaro, a firebrand who was elected in 2018, received 49.10%.

“Today the only winner is the Brazilian people,” da Silva said in a speech Sunday evening at a hotel in downtown Sao Paulo. “It’s the victory of a democratic movement that formed above political parties, personal interests and ideologies so that democracy came out victorious.”

215 million Brazilians

Lula vowed to reunify his country after a toxic race for power which has profoundly divided one of the world’s largest democracies:

“We are going to live new times of peace, love and hope,” said the 77-year-old, who was sidelined from the 2018 election that saw Bolsonaro claim power after being jailed on corruption charges that were later annulled. “I will govern for 215m Brazilians … and not just for those who voted for me. There are not two Brazils. We are one country, one people – a great nation,” he said to applause. “It is in nobody’s interests to live in a country that is divided and in a constant state of war.”

Big Pharma

In April 2021, Lula showed no insight in how Big Pharma invents epidemic warnings and pandemics to boost the sale of vaccines. Instead, he promoted vaccination as a way out of the "pandemic" and described his country as a role model. "Get vaccinated, that's necessary..We have a great culture, a tradition of vaccination, through our experience with diseases. I was president when swine flu (H1N1) hit," Lula said. In three months, 83 million Brazilians were vaccinated,

 

Appointments by Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva

Appointee	Job	Appointed	End
Marina Silva	Brazil/Minister/Environment and Climate Change	1 January 2003	13 May 2008
Marina Silva	Brazil/Minister/Environment and Climate Change	1 January 2023
Nísia Trindade	Brazil/Minister/Health	1 January 2023

 

Related Quotations

Page	Quote	Author	Date
John Perkins	“I asked [Lula's emissary] whether Lula had been corrupted and for how long. It was obvious that this question made him extremely uncomfortable. After a long pause, he admitted that Lula was part of the system. "Otherwise, how could he have risen to such a position?" However, Jose also professed his admiration for Lula. "He's a realist. He understands that in order to help his people he has no choice ..." Then he shook his head. "I fear," he said, "that Washington will try to bring Lula down if he goes too far." "How do you think they'd do it?" "Everyone has—as you say—skeletons in his closet. Every politician has done things that can look bad, if brought into the light in a certain way. Lula has skeletons. If the powers that run your empire want to bring him down, they'll open the closet door."”	John Perkins	2007
Silvina Romano	“Lawfare is a political war through the courts, which uses legal tools improperly for political persecution, which uses the law as a weapon to destroy the adversary. Lawfare operates from high places through a judicial apparatus that rises above the Legislative and Executive Power, expanding the margin of maneuver and power of the judges, paving the way for a growing “juristocracy”.”	Silvina Romano	December 2020

 

Related Document

Title	Type	Publication date	Author(s)	Description
Document:Brazil is back	email	31 October 2022	Aline Piva	“We defeated authoritarianism and fascism in this country. Democracy is back in Brazil,” said Lula. Today, Progressive International congratulates our friends, allies, and comrades in Brazil and celebrates the founding of a new, internationalist Brazil.

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