How do Brazilians feel about President Bolsonaro's handling of COVID-19?
작성자 : 임두빈 작성일 : 2020-12-30 13:43:09 조회수 : 601

What needs to be understood before anything is written on this matter is that Jair Bolsonaro has become not just some political leader, but a nearly messianic, prophet-like figure for about 2 or 3 in 10 Brazilian citizens, so that all mistakes, sins, suspicions, anything that might be bad for the reputation and popular approval of any normal political leader doesn’t taint his image to his diehard, nearly unconditional supporters, who constitute about 20–25% of the Brazilian population and deep down approve him because they have a very deep personal affinity with Bolsonaro’s values and attitudes no matter what he actually does for the country, and to those who are still so eager to find (at last) a kind of politician-hero-savior-redeemer that they are willing to tolerate all kinds of perceived mistakes and suspicious attitudes (those are about 10% of the population).

ABOVE: Jair Bolsonaro greets supporters in April in a right-wing protest that became the center of a huge discussion in Brazil due to the open statements of a sizeable part of the protesters in favor of a military coup d’état and authoritarian measures against other powers of the Republic and political opponents.

That is so far a rock-solid political basis on Bolsonaro’s behalf… but the other 65–70% of the population, who have little personal affection (often bordering on idolatry) for Bolsonaro and support or do not support him based on what he actually says and does, and whatever political options are available on the table – that is a different matter. Brazil is highly polarized now more than ever, and increasingly there is a high polarization not just between the left-wing and the right-wing, but also within the center and the right of the political spectrum: there is now a large right-wing that is anti-Bolsonaro, and a right-wing that is more bolsonarista than anything else ideologically. That means that after 1.5 years of Bolsonaro’s tenure, the country is increasingly divided between anti-Bolsonaro and pro-Bolsonaro: to his supporters, even traditional and staunchly anti-leftist right-wing figures of the country are now somehow “communist” because they criticize their leader and/or democratically support the legitimacy and political survival of the left-wing as a part of the country’s political system.

Therefore, you’re unlikely to see self-conscious support or lack thereof for Bolsonaro’s behavior and decisions to go down 25–30% even if he screw things up really bad. Only that can explain how it is possible that, in April 6th, 76% of people were in favor of social isolation/distancing to fight Covid-19 and 82% approved the actions and recommendations of the Ministry of Health of Brazil

(which was openly countering what Bolsonaro has been saying, causing the Minister of Health Luiz Henrique Mandetta to be sacked in April 16)… and yet 1/3 of the population still thinks Bolsonaro’s government is good or great.

This is what bolsonarismo is in Brazil in 2020: there are people who have had relatives killed by Covid-19 and were fighting doctors and media to deny that their relatives’s deaths were caused by the new virus, because they would have to admit the ideologically driven narratives of “exaggeration” and “sensationalist hysteria” spread by Bolsonaro and his closest allies were incorrect. That’s how insanely fanatic things have become for that 1/3 of the population.

The other 2/3 are moving on, though – and increasingly fed up with what they’re seeing. Now 54% of the population favor Bolsonaro’s impeachment

after less than 1.5 years of his government. Richer and more educated people in particular have been changing their opinions about the president (for the worse) rapidly since the coronavirus pandemic struck the country. 56% of those who have a tertiary degree of education (college) think his handling of the pandemic has been bad or awful.

As of April 27th, 46% of the population thinks he should renounce his Presidency right now, and 45% think his handling of the coronavirus crisis has been bad or terrible, while 25% think it’s been only regular

. 49% of the population think he is simply unable to rule the country. Unsurprisingly (you have been warned that Bolsonaro has an unconditional and mostly uncritical support of 25–30% in the country), 27% think his handling of the crisis has been good or excellent. Only 21% of the population thinks you can always trust what Bolsonaro says, while 38% think you can never trust anything he says.

That in practice means that basically only those who are not just citizens, but fans of Bolsonaro think he’s doing a good job as far as the coronavirus pandemic is concerned.

Probably not even if Brazil becomes the epicenter of the pandemic, and dozens of thousands of people die, including relatives of those people, his support rate wouldn’t go much lower than 25%, because, as I implied before, it’s become a matter of sectarian ideology centered around the figure of the infallible strongman and “father of the nation who will sacrifice himself to save us” (some of you could perhaps identify that as some kind of proto-fascist thought, and you wouldn’t be incorrect), not a matter of rational analysis of what the government is doing or failing to do.

The other 70% of the population who retain some indepencence of thought, though, is increasingly impatient and angry about Bolsonaro’s reckless and idiosyncratic way of governing, especially on what refers to the coronavirus pandemic.

ABOVE: One of the many panelaços (pan protests at home) against Bolsonaro that have been happening throughout Brazil since the start of the spread of the coronavirus pandemic in Brazil, in mid March. This video was done when he sacked Luiz Henrique Mandetta from the Ministry of Health due to increasing divergences with his pro-social isolation measures.

 

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It would be great if the handling of Covid-19 could be attributed to a single person, isn’t it? Unfortunately, I’m sure few Brazilians would even attempt to answer this question now. Brazilian politics is so chock full of intricate plot twists that explaining it to someone that was offline for a week is a Herculean task. Let alone someone who doesn’t speak the language and doesn’t know the characters.

President Bolsonaro called for a state of emergency on February 4 (from memory). His government prepared to help the victims by planning campaign hospitals, buying medical equipment and planning how to trace cases and help the vulnerable. It was also true that he set a clear policy of telling the wider population that apart from vulnerable people, most persons would experience the disease as a strong, not life threatening, cold. And that the economic effects of a full lockdown should not be more damaging than the epidemiological effects of the virus. The government’s preferred approach would be to keep businesses open.

The governors of Rio, São Paulo and other states excluding Minas Gerais at that point had a very strange attitude. São Paulo’s government altered the directives that require doctors to certify the cause of death. They claimed it was necessary that any health worker could do so in case doctors were overwhelmed during the upcoming epidemic. Autopsy was also made unnecessary, to protect health workers from contamination. And if the cause of death was unknown, Coronavirus must be assumed.

However, the governors still allowed carnival to happen, and only started sounding alarms after the traditional street partying had put tourists and Brazilians in close proximity. And that’s when the first coronavirus cases were diagnosed.

Then many governors decreed full lockdown and called the state police apparatus to arrest people who defied the lockdown. This happened as the Supreme Court decided that convicted criminals of non violent crimes (i.e., corruption crimes) would be released to protect them from being contaminated while in custody.

President Bolsonaro spoke in national broadcasts against this. His health minister supported the governors. The minister was sacked.

It happens that the state governors, according to the Brazilian constitution, cannot put restrictions on personal liberties such as freedom of association and freedom of movement. Only the president after receiving permission from the Congress can do that, via decreeing a state of siege. He didn’t ask for it and the Congress didn’t vote for it.

Instead, he asked to deviate from the approved budget, so he could make emergency expenditures to handle the crisis. The Congress approved that request. The government is going to hand out money to people who have lost their daily income due to the lockdown.

Then evidence started to surface that state governments expenses with medical supplies were overpriced, fake invoices were given… The usual corruption schemes. The minister of justice, Sérgio Moro, of operation carwash fame, threatened to investigate and punish all those involved.

A week later, that same Sérgio Moro resigned, while being cheered by supporters of the state governments.

At The moment the country is, as much as ever, split between die hard Bolsonaro supporters and die hard Bolsonaro enemies. Coronavirus is but a sideshow. The attention is on those politicians who debate whether this is the right moment to impeach Bolsonaro, although, quite frankly, no accusation of crime has been made against him yet.

“But he is a fascist! A genocidal maniac!”

Yes, fine. Go find that in the penal code.

What do I think?

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Bolsonaro, his administration, his sons and his supporters that now are only 23% are all under several investigations ranging from:

  • Fraudulent election
  • Perjury
  • Embezzlement
  • Drug trafficking
  • Money laundering
  • Fake news(a federal crime in Brazil)
  • Treason and attempt to overthrow democracy!
  • Murder
  • Involvement with death squads!
  • Involvement with organized crime!
  • Being part of militias!
  • Creating ghost employees and collecting their pay!
  • Creating ghost candidates and collecting their federal budget allocations!
  • Paying people with tax payer money to attack parliament, the Supreme Court and the senate!
  • Using the federal police illegally to protect themselves from crimes committed!
  • Spending 290 thousand per month on the presidential card!

The list just goes on and on! They are also accused of excepting nearly 10 billion from the fbi, American DOJ and state department to falsely accuse and apprehend the leftist government politicians so bolsonaro could be elected and completely sell out our democracy, economy, natural resources to the us corporations! He even faked being stabbed so he didn’t have to debate, after failing miserably in the first debate! Here is the picture from right after the stabbing, as he was carried away:

translation: shameful is the guy use a scheduled apêndice surgery to fake a stabbing!

As you can see there’s no blood, not even a cut in the shirt! On YouTube your will find the video os the incident that clearly show it was fake! The supposed criminal that stabbed him was then pardoned by him and the judges decided to no longer investigate the case!

Justiça arquiva inquérito que apurava participação de terceiros em atentado contra Jair Bolsonaro

Translation: this means that they won’t investigate if the militia family contracted Adelio, to simulate a stabbing that gave the election victory to the crook!

Translation: justice decide to not open inquiry to judge any others involvement with the attack against Jair Bolsonaro!

The bolsonaros are criminals(9 members of their family are under investigation for crimes related to envolvimento with organized crime), his wife’s uncle is serving time for being one of the leaders of the most violent and corrupt militia in Rio de Janeiro. The same milícia accused of killing city representative Marielle Franco 2 years ago! 6 of his organized community stalking leaders, were arrested last Monday and are facing up to 22 years in prison, his son Carlos Bolsonaro(that was trained by Steve Bannon) to lead the same fake news machine they used to elect trump here in 2016, is under investigation for being the head of the do called “hate cabinet” that threatened, smear, attacked both physically and electronic anyone they wanted, including parliamentarians, senators, politicians, judges, prosecutors, etc.

Several businessmen are now also under investigation and indictments for financing the campaigns! Bolsonaro himself and his Vice President are now facing an investigation that will bring about the annulment of their election for being fraudulent, hacked and based on fake news!

 

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