Machinations by men of God help keep Bolsonaro competitive

Finally, years after the case first came to light, Brazil's far-right president Jair Bolsonaro was last week charged by federal prosecutors with stealing public money while a federal deputy.

Prosecutors accused him of “administrative impropriety” in pocketing for himself the salary of a phantom member of his congressional staff and demanded the former army man return the cash pilfered from the public coffers. The charges are a blow for a politician who frequently boasts that, unlike his opponents, he had never been charged with corruption, though given his family’s dubious history this says more about Brazil’s justice system than Bolsonarian rectitude.

But the news of charges in the case of Wal de Açaí – the woman nominally earning a federal salary in Brasília, all while selling bowls of açaí (a fruit-based dessert) on the Rio coast where she also looked after the dogs at the Bolsonaro summer house – had to compete for attention with another scandal breaking last week.

‘Parallel cabinet’

This one involved the Presbyterian pastor in charge of the education ministry, Milton Ribeiro. First one newspaper revealed that inside his ministry a "parallel cabinet" staffed by two evangelical pastors who hold no official position were negotiating the distribution of public money in return for bribes. In illustrating how the scheme operated one mayor said these evangelical pastors demanded a kilo of gold from him in exchange for funding for his town.

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The pastors said they were only seeking donations for church activities and the administration tried to brush off the revelations.

But then another newspaper obtained a recording in which Ribeiro could be heard saying the scheme was nothing to do with him and the pastors were operating following a “special request” from the president.

Despite the gravity of the revelations which have resulted in yet another investigation into the administration’s wrongdoing, the president and the minister have tried to hang tough, though by Monday the pressure on Ribeiro to quit was intensifying. This rare display of presidential loyalty underlines the importance of Bolsonaro’s alliance with the country’s evangelical Christian movement is to his re-election hopes in October.

These have shown signs of improving in recent weeks. In part this is because the economy is picking up steam again after the pandemic. The war in Ukraine has caused the government problems with a spike in fuel prices. But as a major commodity exporter Brazil has seen prices for some of its main exports shoot up because of market disruption caused by the war. This is boosting its trade balance and strengthening the local currency, which could ease building inflationary pressures.

The uptick in Bolsonaro’s approval ratings is also the result of a pre-election spending spree that many analysts warn risks a fiscal reckoning next year. But Bolsonaro, who has always preferred campaigning to governing, will not worry about this lack of prudence if it delivers votes. His reckless dispensation of largesse is targeted at key constituencies such as the military, cops and truckers.

Reactionary agenda

But evangelicals are fundamental to any hopes he has of making it a close race. They make up a third of Brazil’s electorate. His rejection rating among them is significantly lower than it is generally, largely thanks to their shared reactionary cultural agenda. Many evangelical pastors are also loyal defenders of the president against the now numerous examples of his corruption, incompetence and authoritarianism because he promotes their interests best symbolised by his appointment of a mediocre but “terribly evangelical” lawyer to the supreme court.

Evangelical newspapers and online media channels are also busily trying to smear Bolsonaro's main rival, former president Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, going so far as to claim he has entered into a pact with the devil, even circulating a doctored video as evidence.

Despite such diabolical machinations by the men of God, Lula remains far ahead in the polls and is still the clear favourite. But Bolsonaro is showing signs he will be competitive and a closer than expected race might be all he needs.

It was noticeable that as well as defending his embattled education minister the president last week once again returned to casting doubt on Brazil’s voting system. After three years of misrule Bolsonaro’s strategy for holding on to power is being mapped out in real time – do any and everything to rally the base and if that is not enough, challenge the result.