MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

Brazil: Lula wants to return to power but it's not up to just him

“I am working to be a candidate,” Lula said

Former Brazilian President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva has explained in an interview published over the weekend that he wants to return to power “so that people can eat three times a day.”

Lula also told the Spanish newspaper El País that he wanted Brazil “to regain the prestige” it once had and he claimed current President Jair Bolsonaro “does not understand the soul” of Brazilians.

”When I left the Presidency in 2010, Brazil was in a situation of economic growth and respectability. Today it is bankrupt (...) And the hunger that had ended in Brazil in 2014 returned with great force. Brazil was an international protagonist and everything has been dismantled,“ Lula explained.

Despite all his words, the former head of state insists he had not yet launched his candidacy, about which a decision is due between February and March ”because there is much to decide.“ Nevertheless, he admitted: ”I am working to be a candidate.“

”But it does not depend on a personal will, it does not depend on me. I have to build a program for Brazil with other people and with other parties. I have to make an alliance, because the important thing is not just winning the elections, it is being able to rule,“ he explained.

”If I return to the Presidency, I cannot do less than I did. That is why I am afraid. I cannot return and do nothing so that Brazil can recover; I cannot fail,“ he went on.

Lula also said President Jair Bolsonaro ”is a liar, he does not understand the economy, he does not understand social problems“ and warned right-wing radicalism or fascism were ”increasingly aggressive and growing in various places.“

Asked about his imprisonment for corruption, Lula stressed ”nobody can want to govern to take revenge.“ But regarding Nicaragua's recent elections which the international community has deemed to be rigged, Lula said that ”I cannot judge what has happened in Nicaragua. If (President Daniel) Ortega stops the opposition leaders from running in the elections, just as they did against me, he is completely wrong.“

Lula also addressed the Cuban situation: ”Who decides the freedom of Cuba if not the Cuban people? The problem of democracy in Cuba will not be solved by instigating opponents to create problems for the Government. It will be conquered when the US blockade“ ends.

Lula was in Madrid last Friday, where he met with Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez on the last stop of his European tour during which he he met with various political leaders such as French President Emmanuel Macron and future German Chancellor Olaf Scholz.

Lula and Sánchez discussed ”the role that Spain and Brazil can have for the consolidation of development in Latin America, with supportive and democratic governments,” according to a statement from Lula's press team.