Bolsonaro, the third former Brazilian president to be disqualified

Jair Bolsonaro became this Friday the third former Brazilian president who is disqualified from disputing elective positions or holding public office, after being convicted in the electoral Court for abuses of power in the 2022 elections.

With that decision and lacking exhaustion of all resources, the far-right leader, 68, You will not be able to contest any election for the next eight years.

The Superior Electoral Court, by 5 votes in favor and 2 votes against, condemned him for using his position as head of state (2019-2022) “to degrade the electoral environment” and create a state of “collective paranoia” with “false information” and “heinous lies”.

Bolsonaro thus joins two other former Brazilian heads of state who were also stripped at some point of their political rights since the restoration of democracy in 1985.

The current president, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, was also declared ineligible, but for a different reason.

In 2018, the progressive leader was sentenced in the second instance to 12 years and 1 month in prison for a corruption case.

That sentence framed him in the so-called “Clean Record Law”, which prevents those convicted in second instance from running for elective positions.

The Workers’ Party (PT) tried to nominate him as a presidential candidate in the 2018 elections, which Bolsonaro would win, but the Electoral Justice rejected his registration as he was sentenced in an appeal court.

However, in 2021, the Supreme Court annulled that and another corruption conviction against Lula, a ruling that allowed him to recover his political rights and run for the 2022 presidential elections, which he would win against Bolsonaro by a narrow margin.

The other disqualified former president was Fernando Collor (1990-1992), who during his tenure was accused of participating in a corrupt scheme, which triggered Congress to launch an impeachment trial against him.

In a context of serious economic crisis, Collor resigned in order to avoid being removed by Congress and maintain his political rights, but despite leaving the Presidency, the Senate approved his disqualification for eight years.

In 2006 he stood in the Senate elections and He won a seat for the state of Alagoas.

Last May, the Supreme Court sentenced him to eight years and ten months in prison for corruption and money laundering, for receiving bribes between 2010 and 2014, while serving as a senator.

Collor awaits the resolution of the appeals presented by his defense.

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