After Bolsonaro, Can Lula Remake Brazil? |

"Lula, in his campaign, had talked in almost messianic terms about his desire to “rescue” Brazil. He had also begun to speak about God, his age, how he felt lucky to have endured his adversities. On the night he finally won, he said, “They tried to bury me alive, but I survived. Here I am.”

When I’d last seen Lula, in December, 2019, he had appeared vigorous and relatively youthful. Now, despite his campaign rhetoric, he seemed a little overwhelmed by the prospects he faced in his mission to save Brazil. Sinking into a chair and exhaling heavily, he said that he’d been on the telephone all morning with world leaders who’d called to congratulate him. When I asked what political initiatives he had planned, he spoke almost by rote, as if still on the campaign trail. But when I said that, outside Brazil, many people expected him to rescue not just his country but the global environment, by reversing the deforestation of the Amazon, his eyes widened almost fearfully, and he exclaimed, “Yes, I know!” Reaching over to grab my knee, he leaned in and began speaking intently of reshaping the country. “People are very optimistic about our governance,” he said. “People are expecting something to change, and it will change.” This was the Lula from the Pop-art poster, the leftist crusader who had enthralled Brazilians since his first appearance on the national stage, forty years earlier. But now the country around him was different, divided sharply between those who loved him and those who despised him."

read newstory by JON LEE ANDERSON 

After Bolsonaro, Can Lula Remake Brazil? | The New Yorker