2018 --"I hope my fellow Brazilians see through Bolsonaro before it’s too late [...] I was born at the tail-end of the dictatorship, hearing stories from my parents, who were active against the regime when they were medical students. They were stories of fear and censorship; of friends and teachers being dragged out of university by police; my father was arrested and beaten; their friends were tortured – all of them teenagers, “just children”, as my mother puts it. After we moved to London, these stories seemed to ebb into the distant past. P - Slowly, over the years, Brazil’s economy began to thrive. PT’s Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva .. https://www.theguardian.com/world/luiz-inacio-lula-da-silva, who was president from 2003 to 2011, introduced several measures to improve racial and economic equality. P - Now, of course, Lula is in prison for corruption .. https://www.theguardian.com/world/2018/sep/11/lula-brazil-presidential-election-candidate-gives-up-race . The idea of Brazil as a thriving Bric country has been swiftly forgotten. Violence is on the rise. The Brazilian Forum of Public Security (BFPS) recently reported that the country broke its own record .. https://www.theguardian.com/world/2018/aug/09/brazil-sets-new-record-for-homicides-63880-deaths .. for murders in a single year after 63,880 people were killed in 2017 – an increase of 3%. Reported rapes are up by 8%. Every day an average of 14 people are killed by police officers. Earlier this year, President Michel Temer handed over control of public security in Rio de Janeiro to the military. No wonder Brazilians are looking for change – but they are looking in the wrong place."
Published 9 March 2021
Brazilian ex-President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, March 2020 EPA
A Supreme Court judge in Brazil has annulled ex-President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva's corruption convictions, opening a path to a possible run for the presidency in 2022.
Lula, who governed Brazil between 2003 and 2010, is a towering figure in left-wing politics in Brazil and beyond.
He is also the most senior politician to have been convicted as part of Operation Car Wash, the corruption scandal which brought down dozens of politician and business leaders across the country but which by some - including Lula - has been denounced as a political witch hunt.
The ban came just over a month before the first round of the election and the man who replaced Lula as the candidate for the Workers' Party, Fernando Haddad, did not have the same recognition or popularity and was defeated by the far-right candidate, Jair Bolsonaro.
Justice Fachin's decision could clear the way for Lula to run for the presidency in 2022, where his main rival would likely be Mr Bolsonaro, who is widely expected to run for a second term in office.
An opinion poll conducted by Ipec on Sunday suggested Lula would gain more votes than Mr Bolsonaro - the only politician to do so.
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