One week after Lula’s taking office in Brazil the Three Powers’ Square was invaded by thousands of Bolsonaro supporters in the middle of the afternoon on the 8th of January, 2023. 

The protestors violently attacked the National Congress building, as well as the Presidential Palace and the Supreme Court. Many masterpieces were destroyed as well as gifts given by international presidents to previous Brazilian presidents since the beginning of the Republic, like porcelain vases, gold, silver and bronze sculptures. Symbols of the Brazilian monarchy were destroyed like Dom João VI’s watch. The piece, considered rare, was given as a gift to Dom João 6º by the court of Luís 14, of France. The hands and numbers of the clock were torn off and a statue that graced the top of the piece was also torn off. “The value of this work is inestimable. The scenario is devastating", said Senator Randolfe Rodrigues”. The biggest part of the classical furniture was damaged and all the wall glasses from the first floor were all broken. 

These protesters were camped around the Three Powers’ Square since the beginning of November and practised the invasion after the end of the ceremony of Lula’s inauguration ceremony on January 1st.

Still, one question remains: why did the police officers not do anything to prevent this from happening? Just before the invasion on Sunday morning, insurrectionists were talking deliberately about their plans: “It is today! It is today or never!” The answer might be that there were many people, specially wives and children from militaries camped together with the protesters who invaded the buildings. 

It redirects the attention to the involvement of the State Military Police that should protect people and institutions despite their particular political views. During a meeting with all Brazilian governors on the evening of the 9th of January, President Lula emphasised the complacency of the Police. Journalists questioned the absence of a State Military Police’s Response even though they were notified by the Brazilian Intelligence Agency (ABIN) about the possibility of invasion and attacks coming from “Bolsonaristas”. 

President Lula made a speech when he was in Araraquara (SP) shortly after the news about the attacks broke. On the same day he travelled to Brasília in order to see the damage. 

In the following days he gathered with all Brazilian governors to discuss the situation and about the new plans for security in Brasília. He also promoted a long walk with all these governors (many of them are Bolsonaristas) through the Three Powers’ Square in order to show the society that despite the governors’ political views, they were together and they would protect democracy. All governors repudiated the attacks in Brasília. Since then, President Lula has been gathering with ministers, governors and journalists, making open discussions about the government’s next steps. 

As President Lula said in his speech regarding this situation: “We have seen many protests happening in front of the Three Powers’ Square but those people were demanding their rights. The people who did it on Sunday do not have a point. They just want a Coup d’État. They are just people who can not accept democracy. They are displeased with the results of the elections and just can not accept it. Never in Brazilian history were the election’s results questioned. Leonel Brizola questioned it when the electronic votes were implemented but it was in the beginning of this technology and not because of the possibility of manipulation of the results. Bolsonaro started it”. 

This whole situation evidenced Bolsonaro’s influence. Since the beginning of his mandate he questioned the veracity of the electronic vote and wanted to change the Brazilian system to paper ballots like in the US. The Supreme Court emphatically responded that it would not be changed and that there is no possibility of manipulation of the results. 

If the results could be manipulated as Bolsonaro and his supporters alleged, why did he not win the elections in October then?

The Supreme Court has controlled and pruned Bolsonaro’s attitudes, reminding people that the President can not act just by himself and that the Legislative Power has the duty and the right of conducting good policies for all people and not just for those who support the President. Some examples could be the banning of some profiles on Facebook and Twitter managed by his sons and his allies in order to propagate fake news, the emphasis on the reliability of the electoral system, the orders over unblocking the streets when protesters pro-Bolsonaro blocked railways after the elections in October and investigations over financial movements in Bolsinaro’s bank accounts. 

Bolsonaro acted many times as if he could change to suit his political avancement.  An example could be that the chief of the Military Forces in Brazil is the President of the Republic despite the Party to which they belong to. When Bolsonaro was the President he was their chief. Now President Lula is their chief. Instead, Bolsonaro used to emphasise that he was the real chief of the Military Forces despite his position as a President or not. This behaviour is anti-democratic on his part. This situation influenced some people inside the Military Forces. That could be seen when President Lula was walking towards the local area of his speech on the day of his taking office and some service members did not bow down as a sign of respect and subordination. It meant at that time that they did not recognise or accept him as their leader as did Bolsonaro when he kept in silence after Lula’s victory in elections or when he left the country a few days before Lula’s inauguration.

The far-right has planted seeds of hate and violence in Brazil. That is why the attacks happened on January 8th. One of the most destroyed places in the Palace was the room of the Supreme Court, mainly the chair of the leader Alexandre de Moraes, who Bolsonaristas call a dictator. Moraes has never acted above the law. All of his acts were according to the Brazilian Constitution. It is also important to say that the Brazilian far-right has tried to convince people that Nazism was a left-wing movement and that the Earth is flat. They tried to deconstruct not only everything that brought social, economic, and political progress to Brazil but also the notion of universal truth itself. 

Another thing that should be underlined is that Bolsonaro encouraged people not to take Covid vaccines during the hard times of the pandemic and this is also a sign of negationism of facts. Bolsonaro has also made many jokes about people dying asphyxiated.

The vaccines have slowed down the number of deaths all over the world. Bolsonaro’s Covid policy was taken to the Hague Tribunal when he was accused of genocide. Another fact is that Bolsonaro many times praised dictators like Coronel Ustra, one of the biggest torturers of the Military Dictatorship in Brazil, Augusto Pinochet in Chile, and Alfredo Stroessner in Paraguay. Many times Bolsonaro and his sons defended the closure of the National Congress and some of his supporters defended the recovery of the Institutional Act 5 (AI-5) which represented the end of the Habeas Corpus in the period of dictatorship. At that time, people could be arrested for any reason considered to be a threat to the government and they had no right to self-defence. AI-5 represents the harshest decision from the Military Regime in Brazil. This regime lasted 25 years, from 1964 to 1989. 

Whilst Bolsonaro fled to the US a few days before Lula’s taking office abandoning his supporters there is still a good part of them trying to get him back to the presidency. There is not an official declaration about his travel to the US. Some people believe that he did not want to be in Brazil while his opponent was taking office, and others believe that he is afraid of the possibility of being arrested for his crimes.  It has already been discovered that many agribusiness companies as well as particular individuals have sponsored the terrorists that attacked the Three Powers’ Square on Sunday. The names of the companies have not been revealed by the General Attorney of the Union (AGU in Portuguese).

It is important to underline that voting for Bolsonaro or the far-right does not represent just an opposition to the Worker’s Party or Lula’s figure after the attacks on January 8th. Now, it also means supporting vandals, criminals, terrorists, hate speech, violence, intolerance and the destruction of common values. Bolsonaro has a big influence on what happened because he has been stimulating this kind of behaviour in his speeches and interviews. “Words have power” is an important observation made by Flávio Dino, the current Minister of Justice and Public Security of Brazil and Senator elected by the state of Maranhão. His statement has become a common quote within journalists since the episode broke.  

Until now, more than 1400 people have been arrested and the Distrito Federal’s governor (Ibaneis Rocha) has been removed from office because of his affinity to Bolsonaro and his negligence over the signs of an imminent attack before Sunday. In addition, Anderson Torres, the former Distrito Federal’s Secretary of Public Security was accused of complicity with the crimes. Besides that, the Federal Police found a draft of a decree at his house to establish a State of Defense in the Superior Electoral Court (TSE) and change the result of the 2022 elections. Torres is now in the US and has not returned to Brazil yet. It is also important to underline that the protesters were escorted by the State Military Police until they arrived at the attacked buildings. 

The investigation, one of the biggest in history, remains ongoing, the sponsors are being investigated, the arrested people are being prepared for their judgement and new security strategies are being discussed. An intervention has been approved in Brasília and until January 31st the security in Brasília will be under the Federal Police instance. Meanwhile, Bolsonaro has been hospitalised in the US since January 9th because of abdominal pains. This can be interpreted as a strategy since his name was quoted by Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Member of the United States House of Representatives: “The US must cease granting refuge to Bolsonaro in Florida” because people are becoming aware that Bolsonaro always gets hospitalised when things get worse for him. 

Looking at the coming weeks:

• Security in Brasília will be administered by the Federal Police until the end of January

• Military Police might be regarded as unreliable as some of them supported the attacks that were carried out. For instance, many of them didn’t stop the protestors from entering governmental buildings. However, these individuals do  not represent the whole military police force.  

• Bolsonaro and his supporters might lose power because of the bad reactions all over the world about the attacks to the Three Powers’ Square

• President Lula might regain trust from some of his opponents because of the transparency and pacifism on how he is dealing with the security problems

• Protesters will be punished, arrested and judged and the sponsors will be punished so then it will not repeat in the future

• Bolsonaro and his supporters might be prosecuted if any relation with these attacks is proved

• Brazil is now having to adapt to new challenges as it has never happened before in its history and probably the Security Strategy will be reinforced not only in Brasília but also in the entire country

• The attacks can lead to the start of a reunification in Brazilian politics since even right-wing governors supported President Lula evidencing a union in Politics’ goals

*Photograph in article cover: Adriano Machado/Reuters