MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

Marina Silva announces support for Lula after years away from PT

Silva distanced herself from the PT for years but began a rapprochement campaign as a response to Bolsonaro's policies toward the Amazon

Environmentalist leader Marina Silva Monday warned that democracy was at stake in next month's elections as she announced her support for former President Luiz Inácio Lula Da Silva of the Workers' Party (PT) against the incumbent Jair Bolsonaro.

“We have the threat of threats, it threatens our democracy with the corrosion of our social fabric,” said the leader of the Sustainability Network party (Red, center-left), who also spoke of “democracy or barbarism.”

She insisted: “Democracy or annihilation of the indigenous peoples. Democracy or annihilation of the black people who are dying in our periphery, democracy or destruction of the Amazon.”

“I manifest my support independently to Lula,” she stressed during a joint press conference in São Paulo. Lula and Silva had already met Sunday to discuss environmental issues.

Silva was Minister of the Environment from 2003 to 2008 under Lula. In 2009 she left the PT after 30 years. In 2014, when she ran for president, she was strongly attacked by Dilma Rousseff's (PT) campaign. At the time, she even stated that she never thought the PT would try to destroy her.

Silva has already endorsed Fernando Haddad's (PT) candidacy for Governor of São Paulo.

Lula posted a picture of him and Silva on Sunday, saying that they talked for two hours and that she had come up with “proposals for a more sustainable Brazil.

”Today, at my invitation, after many years, I met again with @MarinaSilva. We remembered our history, from when we first met. We talked for two hours and she presented me with proposals for a more sustainable and fairer Brazil that will once again protect the environment,” Lula wrote on Sunday.

A native of the state of Acre, Silva distanced herself from the PT for years but began a rapprochement campaign as a response to Bolsonaro's policies toward the Amazon, where deforestation rates grew after his accession to power.