Al Jazeera News :
Following Brazil’s Supreme Court decision to reject former President Luiz Inacio ‘Lula’ da Silva’s plea to avoid jail time while he exhausts all appeals over his corruption conviction, Brazilians are divided on what the ruling means for the country.
Lula da Silva, who had high approval ratings during his presidency, was
convicted last year of taking bribes in return for helping an engineering company gain contracts with the state-run oil company.
He has described the conviction as a “political witch-hunt” and his defence team maintains he was convicted without any material evidence.
Thursday’s Supreme Court decision was met by protests both in favour of and against the former president, representing a deep divide within the country.
“I see on Facebook and Twitter that people are totally insane,” Celso Dossi, a 39-year-old Brazilian writer, told Al Jazeera. Carlos Henrique de Oliverira Ramos, a student in Sao Paulo, said the decision is an ongoing attempt by the current government to keep Lula from power.
“[Lula’s] arrest without overwhelming evidence, however, it’s another chapter of an ongoing coup in Brazil since 2016, with the powerful deposing of Dilma for a crime of responsibility that was legalised a few days after it is stopped,” Carlos Henrique de Oliverira Ramos, a student in Sao Paulo, told Al Jazeera, referring to the impeachment of former President Dilma Rousseff, which she and her supporters have repeatedly called a “coup”.
Eduardo Jose Alfonso, a professor at Sao Paulo University, agreed, saying: “The current government is doing everything possible to ensure that Lula cannot be re-elected.”
For Rafeal Longo, a 28-year-old kinesiologist from Sao Paulo, however, the ruling “represents a start of a new cycle of Brazilian democracy where politicians like ex-presidents aren’t above the law”.
Following Brazil’s Supreme Court decision to reject former President Luiz Inacio ‘Lula’ da Silva’s plea to avoid jail time while he exhausts all appeals over his corruption conviction, Brazilians are divided on what the ruling means for the country.
Lula da Silva, who had high approval ratings during his presidency, was
convicted last year of taking bribes in return for helping an engineering company gain contracts with the state-run oil company.
He has described the conviction as a “political witch-hunt” and his defence team maintains he was convicted without any material evidence.
Thursday’s Supreme Court decision was met by protests both in favour of and against the former president, representing a deep divide within the country.
“I see on Facebook and Twitter that people are totally insane,” Celso Dossi, a 39-year-old Brazilian writer, told Al Jazeera. Carlos Henrique de Oliverira Ramos, a student in Sao Paulo, said the decision is an ongoing attempt by the current government to keep Lula from power.
“[Lula’s] arrest without overwhelming evidence, however, it’s another chapter of an ongoing coup in Brazil since 2016, with the powerful deposing of Dilma for a crime of responsibility that was legalised a few days after it is stopped,” Carlos Henrique de Oliverira Ramos, a student in Sao Paulo, told Al Jazeera, referring to the impeachment of former President Dilma Rousseff, which she and her supporters have repeatedly called a “coup”.
Eduardo Jose Alfonso, a professor at Sao Paulo University, agreed, saying: “The current government is doing everything possible to ensure that Lula cannot be re-elected.”
For Rafeal Longo, a 28-year-old kinesiologist from Sao Paulo, however, the ruling “represents a start of a new cycle of Brazilian democracy where politicians like ex-presidents aren’t above the law”.
