Brazil’s new elected president: bad for people, devastating for the environment

Moved by a huge economic and political crisis, Brazilian people have decided to give
power to a far-right candidate that sustains an explicitly fascist discourse. With an
atypical electoral campaign, Bolsonaro’s statements attracted a disorganized and
discontented mass and served as a vehicle for their dissatisfactions. Without a proper plan
of government or other concrete proposals other than “we ought to change what is in
there”, the candidate presented himself as a third way, distinct from the “old way” of
doing politics. An intentionally poor political campaign has achieved the task of creating
an alternative image of the candidate - close to the people, far from politicians – that
worked as a strong shield from his own statements. It did not matter what kind of inanity
he would say, he represented the change and some people believed that he would not be
capable of doing as he said, as the institutions would not permit. Not everybody,
however, trusted that Brazilian’s fragile democracy was immune to fascism, which
motivated a counter-movement against him, which became known by “Ele não” (Not
him). Starred mainly by women that recognized the danger of electing such candidate, the
action tried to draw attention to the misogynist, racist and homophobic character of
Bolsonaro. The movement has been effective in mobilizing people against fascism and
marked women’s position, but it was not enough to avoid the candidate electoral success.
On the other side, some of the people unsatisfied with the current political and
economical scenario and with an extreme rejection to the Workers Party (PT, which held
the presidency for 12 years), doubted that the candidate would go on with his absurd
discourse when elected and have chosen to pay the price. But little did they know how
high would this cost be to the country and also to their lives. Just a couple of days after
being elected and before taking office, the new elected president have already shown
what he came for. His first announcement has been regarded to the fusion of the
environment and agriculture Ministries. Those two ministries have complete distinct
agendas that are opposed in many aspects. Especially in Brazil, a country that hasn’t
solved its lands issues, agribusiness and environment have radically contrasting interests.
Because of that, specialists understood this decision more as an extinction of the Ministry
of the Environment than as an actual fusion. Since one of its roles is to regulate the
Ministry of Agriculture, the Ministry of the Environment would lose its function. In other
words, the environment would be subordinate to agribusiness, which would have
practically no limitations. After a bad reception of this announcement by the civil society
and specialists, the new government reconsidered the decision. Unfortunately, Brazilian
society has nothing to celebrate. The new elected president actions do not promise to be
different or better than what has already been presented so far. Furthermore, Bolsonaro’s
party, the Social Liberal Party (PSL), defends a liberal view of the economy and an
ultraconservative perspective regarding mores, which has a strong effect to
environmental policies. For an example, in 2017, the only federal deputy elected from
PSL have voted all the times in favor of the reduction of environmental reserves. But if
last year there was only one federal deputy of PSL, this year the party has achieved the
second biggest bench of the Congress, with 52 parliamentarians. With coalitions already
settled with conservative parties, Bolsonaro has almost guaranteed majority in the
Congress, which will make way for him to govern without difficulties. We have now to
trust and fortify more than ever the societal resistance and the role of the social
movements in order to fight this government and mitigate its inevitable damages.