Friday, September 9, 2022

Cecilia Tornaghi on Al Jazeera: Brazil's Upcoming Presidential Election

"We are in a stalemate right now; we’re not discussing issues, we’re discussing who I like and who I don’t," said the Americas Quarterly managing editor.

Americas Quarterly Managing Editor Cecilia Tornaghi spoke to Al Jazeera's Femi Oke on The Stream about the upcoming presidential election in Brazil. Tornaghi elaborated on the two presidential candidates, far-right current President Jair Bolsonaro and former center-left President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva. "This election should have been in 2018. In 2018, Lula was ahead in the polls when he was arrested and taken to jail…a few months before the election," said Tornaghi. "Lula has a banner of poverty, fighting against poverty. He is an incredibly well-spoken man, he really has the power of words, and resonates with people, but so does Bolsonaro in a completely different narrative." Tornaghi explained that an important factor in the elections is hunger, "I think if you have 33 million people hungry in the country, when it gets to the vote, it’s one vote, one person. It doesn’t matter what your bank account is like. Once you have this scenario, I think that is going to count the most at the moment of voting." "It's not an election of which policy we want, it’s an election of which idol we have. Right now, we are having this dispute of, 'My candidate’s better than yours' and it is a good versus evil election, not an election on issues and I don’t know how we get out of this," said Tornaghi. "We are in a stalemate right now; we’re not discussing issues, we’re discussing who I like and who I don’t." <a href="https://www.aljazeera.com/program/the-stream/2022/9/9/who-will-be-brazils-next-president" target="_blank">Watch the full episode</a>.

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Cecilia Tornaghi on Al Jazeera: Brazil's Upcoming Presidential Election

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