Corona policy in Brazil: Bolsonaro rejects allegations

Brazil’s President Bolsonaro has rejected the serious allegations against his corona policy. His government is “responsible for absolutely nothing”. A committee had previously recommended charges.

After the serious allegations of a parliamentary committee of inquiry, Brazil’s President Jair Bolsonaro defended his corona policy and denied any wrongdoing by his government.

At the same time, he attacked the committee that initiated the report. “How good it would be if the committee had done something productive for our Brazil,” said Bolsonaro, according to media reports. “They did nothing, except hatred and hostility. But we know that we are absolutely not responsible for anything, we did the right thing from the first moment.”

Accusation: crimes against humanity

In the final report presented on Wednesday, the committee recommended charges against Bolsonaro for his misconduct in the fight against the corona pandemic. In the report, the president is charged with nine crimes, some of which are serious. The allegations range from charlatanism to inciting criminal offenses to crimes against humanity.

In the report, Bolsonaro is accused, among other things, of having “deliberately exposed the population to the specific risk of mass infection”. The committee of inquiry found “the fingerprints” of the president on thousands of Covid-19 dead, said Senator Renan Calheiros, the author of the report.

Consequences for Bolsonaro unclear

According to media reports, 65 more people will be charged, including five ministers or ex-ministers and three sons of Bolsonaro, if the committee wants to. Several ministers and high-ranking government officials as well as hospital managers and relatives of corona victims were heard in the committee over a period of six months. The report is 1200 pages long.

For the time being, however, it remains unclear what consequences the report will have and whether the recommendations will also lead to charges, since Bolsonaro has the backing of Attorney General Augusto Aras. The Bolsonaro ally could protect him from any charge. The initiation of impeachment proceedings against the right-wing radical head of state is also unlikely, as he has sufficient support in Congress to avert such a process.

Bolsonaro threatens election defeat

However, the Bolsonaro report, which is due to run for re-election next year, could be politically damaging. The president is currently under great pressure due to poor popularity ratings and several preliminary investigations against him and those around him. According to surveys, he is threatened with a clear defeat against the left-wing ex-head of state Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva in the election next year.

In total, more than 600,000 corona deaths have been recorded in Brazil since the beginning of the pandemic. The South American country ranks second in the world behind the USA, which, however, has more inhabitants.