Far-right senator Flávio Bolsonaro has been banned from leaving Brazil and ordered to surrender his passports just hours after his dramatic presidential election defeat to left-wing President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva.
The ruling was issued by Supreme Court Justice Alexandre de Moraes, the same judge who oversaw the trial of the senator’s father, former President Jair Bolsonaro, on charges of attempted coup.
Bolsonaro released a video saying the decision was based on an interview given last Friday by his brother, Eduardo Bolsonaro, urging his brother to leave Brazil if he lost the election.
On Monday evening, Bolsonaro’s party issued a statement recognizing the election result, saying: “We recognize the presidential result proclaimed by the electoral court, but believe that the issues raised must be properly clarified through a balanced and democratic political debate.” »
Bolsonaro, like his father four years ago, has still not conceded defeat to Lula.
The court’s brief ruling regarding his passport refers only to a criminal case in which federal police are investigating Flávio Bolsonaro for his possible involvement in a money laundering scheme. The judgment orders him to have no contact with his friend Willer Tomaz, a lawyer linked to betting companies which police suspect were used to launder around £680 million.
She also canceled all of Bolsonaro’s passports, including the diplomatic one he holds as a congressman, and ordered him to surrender them within 24 hours.
Bolsonaro was the first to speak publicly on the issue, even before Brazilian media were aware of the judge’s decision.
In a video posted on social media, he says he had just visited his father, under house arrest in Brasilia, when “Lula’s federal police were at his door and in the middle of the street, and I was ordered to hand over my passports and I was also forbidden to leave the country.”
He added that although his brother – who went into voluntary exile in the United States – said on a US podcast on Friday that he favored the senator leaving Brazil if he lost the election, “I never said that.”
When his Senate term ends early next year, Bolsonaro will no longer hold public office for the first time in 24 years, and will therefore be deprived of the special jurisdiction afforded to office holders.
He is also being investigated in another criminal case over what happened to the £20million he was caught on tape asking a disgraced banker accused of corruption to provide a biopic about his father.
The newspaper Folha de S.Paulo reported that Flávio Bolsonaro had been persuaded to abandon his plan to cancel the elections, which he announced after the results were announced on Sunday evening.
Bolsonaro had claimed that the two-hour extension of voting – intended to allow voters who had been unable to access free and mandatory public transport to vote – had harmed the election, despite the fact that his own campaign had also advocated for an extension.
According to the newspaper, his allies and lawyers told him his argument was legally weak.
Bolsonaro has still not publicly renounced his demand for an annulment, and in the same video he said he would file another suit to have Lula’s ticket disqualified for alleged abuse of economic power, a case similar to others his legal team brought during the campaign.
Gn world
