In a chilling replication of the violence in the US Capitol in Washington DC by supporters of former US President Donald Trump two years back, hundreds of supporters of Brazil’s recently ousted President Jair Bolsonaro stormed the country’s seats of power – the Congress, the Presidential palace and the Supreme Court – in the capital Brasilia, damaging public property and offices. About 1,500 rioters have been arrested since the mayhem 8 January, according to Brazilian Justice Minister Flavio Dino.
The violence was unleashed a week after the new President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva took charge following a victory over Bolsonaro in a run-off election 30 October. There are both similarities and dissimilarities between the two assaults on democracy. Bolsonaro is a close ally of Trump and both had threatened not to accept the electoral verdict if it went against them. Both had also cast doubts on the reliability of voting machines and apprehended without any basis electoral fraud by their rivals. Television footage showed the same dangerous pattern of violence in the two incidents. Nearly repeating the vandalism in the Capitol, massive crowds in Brasília walked up a ramp and broke into the Congressional building. Thereafter they entered the Supreme Court and the Presidential palace and the mayhem turned even worse. The floor of the Congress building was flooded after the sprinkler system activated when protesters attempted to set fire to the carpet. Brazil’s Presidential Communications Minister Paulo Pimenta’s description of the scene of violence showed blood, faeces and urine in palace rooms. Onlookers said the marauding crowd seemed beside themselves with hate. They were running down hallways, smashing things, urinating, defecating in the corridors and in the rooms on a destruction spree.
The Federal District Governor Ibaneis Rocha, a Bolsonaro follower, said the arrested “will pay for the crimes committed.” Hours later, however, Rocha himself was suspended from his post for 90 days by Supreme Court Justice Alexandre de Moraes. All this happened because the administration appeared to be still under the influence of Bolsonaro. President Lula charged the incidents would not have taken place without the connivance of pro-Bolsonaro elements in the administration.
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One striking difference between Trump and Bolsonaro is that while Trump had publicly incited his supporters to go on the rampage to undo the election results, Bolsonaro was conspicuous by his absence from the scene of violence. In fact, he was then in the United States, hanging out in a Florida suburb, not far from Disney World. He neither delivered any speeches nor did he exhort the crowds to march on the halls of power. The next day, Bolsonaro reportedly checked into a hospital with abdominal pain. On the other hand, Bolsonaro is yet to fully concede defeat which is why he skipped the installation ceremony of President Lula.
This puts the rampaging supporters of Bolsonaro in a different light, compared to those of Trump. It appears Trump’s supporters needed help from their leader for the attack on the Capitol. But, Bolsonaro’s followers apparently knew what they would do without promptings from their leader. However, this behaviour is not limited to Trump and Bolsonaro.
All across the globe today, one notices autocratic rulers taking over power in democracies. Once they are mounted and well saddled, these leaders tend to think only about their survival in power. In the process, the very people that had voted such leaders into power are the ones who are victimised the most. Creating divisions within social structures, these leaders successfully create bigots in large numbers who are willing to go the extra mile and confront any positive changes that may come through the electoral process. While China’s Xi Jinping is obviously not an elected leader, his colleagues such as Vladimir Putin of Russia, Viktor Orbán of Hungary, Giorgia Meloni of Italy and the heads of states in African countries like Tunisia, Zimbabwe and Tanzania were all duly elected but have turned autocratic and are known to suppress their own people.
Looking closer to home, we have the examples of Pakistan and Myanmar which have openly discarded their respective democratically elected governments, and the army is in command. This trend is visible in most continents across the world. It is easy to understand the similarities between these leaders whose manner of controlling their countries has many common aspects. Creating social and religious divides, weakening Parliament and constitutional institutions, making a mess of the economy, silencing dissent or any opposing views, surveillance to instil fear among citizens and at the end, not accepting people’s verdict if it goes against them.
The rising tide of Far-Right intolerance of democratic values and principles is a great threat to free thinking and liberalism in an increasingly communally and racially polarised world.
