LULA IS ELECTED FOR THE 4TH TIME
For the gringo (affectionate) comrades, I’ll be doing a few comments here, kinda like and AMA, kinda explaining a few things, about the election here in Brazil.
I might set up an FAQ, a glossary, a few basics of voting in Brazil and such. I’m trying to bring some international solidarity.
And for those who want to stare at a “it’s always the same map”, here: Voting abroad - Results. This site is from a big media outlet, they have a nice map. If you want the official government website, here: Supreme Electoral Court - Results.
Let’s get desperate have some fun together!
FAQ
How Brazilians vote?
Badly, against their own interests. I’m just kidding. Voters are assigned a polling station that may change due to some circumstances. In ye olden times, voters would take their voting document (Título de eleitor, or voter’s entitlement(?)), but today, one can vote with their CPF (a SSN, but better) alone. Usually, they vote in a public school close to where they live. There, they have a section number, which translates to a room. They go there, their documents are checked and they are able to vote using the voting machine. It’s usually a quite quick process.
Voting machines?
Although I’m in IT, I don’t know a lot about them. My uni professors know, though. They even audit them from time to time. I do trust them. If you wanna play around with (a virtual) one, here: Official Brazilian Voting Machine Simulator. It plays the iconic sounds, helps you make a santinho (a little cheat sheet).
I saw people using numbers on their votes. What’s that all about?
To cast a vote, you must dial a number on the voting machine. So, if a candidate is from the XYZ party, and their party’s number is 67, they dial 67, go for the green button and that’s it. The legislative branch has a lot of candidates, some from the same party, so they have longer numbers. Using the same party from the example, two candidates might have a 67123 and 67001 as their numbers. You may cast a 67 for the whole party. I don’t remember the math, though.
What’s getting decided?
Country-wide, president. In a few states, the governor too. People have their eye on who’s going to sit at the most important chair for 4(+?) years. The two candidates are Lula (PT - Partido dos Trabalhadores, Worker’s Party) and Flávio Bolsonaro (PL - Partido Liberal, Liberal Party). Their respective numbers are 13 and 22.
How long can people vote?
The international ballots work on their respective countries’ timezone. Domestic voters start voting at 08h00 BST (Brasília Standard Time, UTC-3), ending at 17h00 (5PM). In Brazil, there are four timezones: Fernando de Noronha, at UTC-2, most of the country (population) at UTC-3, almost a half of the country (by area) in UTC-4, and the last, but not least, Acre, at UTC-5. We don’t have daylight savings anymore, so the math is easier.
How long until we know who won?
When the clock strikes 17h00, no voters can enter. If there’s no line, the election officials declare a section closed, the machine is sealed and the votes are transmitted with their integrity assured. They print the report too. Take a look at the website way up from the Electoral Court. Last year, Lula was declared winner at 20h00 (8PM), BST.
What’s at stake?
A lot, really. This is quite complex, but for now, in a tweet, I’d say that although Lula is not the best candidate, I’d happily vote for him instead of Bolsonaro. Lula is old, represents the limits of the social democrats, while his opponent is a mobster, in the most literal sense of the word. To understand what this is, look at the glossary. If Bolsonaro win, we don’t really know what might happen. We have a general idea that most of the worker’s rights will go down the drain, as well as the environmental laws.
Why are you doing this?
I’ll hyperfixate on this for the next few hours, so I think this might be constructive.
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Reserved
Regional Electoral Court orders arrest of Secretary of Transportation in Salvador. PT alleges that less than 50% of the buses are operating, when, during the election, 100% should be operating. The Supreme Electoral Court was asked to extend voting hours until 19h00. Funnily enough, the said Secretary is traveling in France, “on official businesses, invited by the French government”.
For some context: this is a similar maneuver Bolsonaro did last presidential election. I’ll explain a little further in the main post, but he used the Federal Road Police (Policia Rodoviária Federal, PRF) to do something similar. In this specific case, the problem affects more people, as Salvador is quite big. We also know that this is foul play at it’s worst, as Lula won with 65% in the city during the first round, earlier this October. The city’s mayor is from a conservative party, while the governor is from PT.
In Pernambuco State, the right wing governor (Raquel Lyra) used a similar maneuver to make it difficult for people who live in a different city to go to their electoral site, by enacting that buses would be free only if the ticket was emitted after 11pm on the previous day. Pernambuco is one of the states where there’s a pro-Lula majority and the oligarchy often make it difficult for people to go to vote. Jones Manoel and other left wing congressmen put pressure on Raquel Lyra so she would update the decree.
Edit: many times in elections, some land owners sometimes put armed goons in roads to intimidate rural workers to not go to the voting sites.
And the Supreme Court justice, Cármen Lúcia, didn’t allow free tickets for interstate travel. I remember Jones talking about it in a video, specially because the Juazeiro and Petrolina situtation.
An issue is that the order to extend the voting hours came at 17h06 BRT, AFTER the normal closing hour at 17h00 BRT, so some locations have already closed the voting machines.
Yes, with some machines closed/sealed. I did learn about some officers that already went home and are going to need to go back.
The issue was raised by both PL and PT, but the decision was to be taken, originally, by Kássio Nunes Marques. Kássio Nunes is in cahoots with the Bolsonaro clan in many different ways, being the most important one the Banco Master scandal and it’s CEO Daniel Vorcaro.
We take quite some focus on these news, I feel, it’s twofold:
- A lot of people in Brazil depend on public transportation. It’s quite shitty, but inside cities, where most of the population lives, it’s from bearable to good;
- This is a clear and patent way of electoral interference. Since the voting machines are really hard to crack, making people unable to reach their voting stations is the second best choice for the right.
I’d like to add here that this is a strategy of chaos and confusion as a very soft coup attempt. Kassio Nunes Marques did not, himself, change the polling stations. But the Special Group that was made by him to “plan and ensure safety during the elections due to climate change”. It all started with people being pinged about maybe, sorta, kinda, having their polling stations changed. Now, this.
And Lula won! I hate you and love you, you damn SocDem! At least we got rid of Trump’s lieutenant! Four more years where the communists can agitate and grow!
Só uma leve correção camarada, o termo miliciano significa outra coisa que no contexto brasileiro acabou virando palavra para grupos criminosos paramilitares e isso pode confundir um pouco os camaradas que não são familiares com os detalhes da realidade brasileira, então é mais preciso trocar “militiaman” por mobster ou gangster, que é o que ele é, um mafioso do kct.
Feito, que é um daqueles eufemismos que usa ao invés de só falar que é mafioso mesmo.
é que num é nem eufemismo, foi só a palavra que conveio, milicia é qualquer grupo cidadão armado, como as miliciais revolucionárias da venezuela, tem a lenda lá que a chamada do jornal não cabia o nome “organização criminosa paramilitar” aí colocaram “milicia”
This is unrelated to what you likely typed but I think portuguese looks cool :>
you are cool, every comrade is cool
I am not a language though ?!?!
Despite everything, we won. Finally we can rest easy, even if for just a little while.
We all know Lula will go back to its filthy liberal austerity agenda back in January, however we can at least have a bit of relief. However, if the radical left does not use the moment to grow in influence, we will be cooked in 2030.
From my understanding, the left achieved some significant victories prior to this. Inshahallah, comrades in Brazil can organize their way to put down the fascist threat.
Personally, if there is one lesson I think should be learned from Venezuela, it’s that the Latin American left must be united acr9ss the continent to stand up to the US.
Divided movements are easy pickings for the imperialists, and unlike other parts of the global south, the US is in their hemisphere, so the threat is much more permanent.
Fucking exhausted Jesus Christ. But we did it. Not exactly a great offensive victory for the proletariat but a defensive one. Next we have to stave off the inevitable coup attempt. After that we go back to fighting lula lol.
Legality campaign version 2026. We shouldn’t expect the victory to come off very easily.
For those who don’t know Brazilian history. Before 1964, the president and vice-president were elected from the most voted candidate and second most voted candidate, respectively. In 1962, the president was Jânio Quadros, while the vice-president was João Goulart. When João Goulart was in China, in a diplomatic mission, Jânio Quadros, then president, renounced and the reactionary Chamber of deputies tried to take control of the government. Then Leonel Brizola, a left wing congressman, along with laborists and communists, called people to the streets and distributed weapons among the people, to make sure that João Goulart would assume the presidency when he got back from the diplomatic mission. This movement was called the “legality campaign”.
Good work Brazilian comrades.
Ganhamo pô!!!
We won the battle, but the struggle goes on.
Now we need to go after the social media that interfered heavilly with the elections, and then against congress, specially the new one entering next year, if we can’t remove them before that…
this gives me a little glimmer of hope, if the amazon ended “protected” by uncle sam’s viceroys, the world would be pretty f–ed up. obrigado
