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News > Brazil

Not Born to be President, I Was Born to Be Soldier: Bolsonaro

  • Jair Bolsonaro gestures at the Planalto Palace in Brasilia, Brazil, April 5, 2019.

    Jair Bolsonaro gestures at the Planalto Palace in Brasilia, Brazil, April 5, 2019. | Photo: Reuters

Published 6 April 2019
Opinion

After three months in office, Bolsonaro's beginning to publicly admit his inexperience in politics and government.

During a promotion ceremony for generals carried out Friday, Brazil’s President Jair Bolsonaro admitted that the presidency means “only trouble” to him.

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"I was not born to be president, I was born to be a soldier," the far-right head of state said and vowed to work with the delegation of generals "to change Brazil's destiny. Alone I'm not going anywhere."

At another point in his speech, Bolsonaro said that he struggles with government management and the role means only trouble to him.

"I did not think about being president. I ask myself and, looking to God, I say: what did I do to deserve this?"

This is not the first time, however, the right-wing politician has complained about his prestigious position. At the end of his trip to Israel, the former captain said the presidency was like a "pineapple," a metaphor which he later explained, admitting that he was "tired."

Later, when asked by journalists if the presidency was more difficult than he expected and if he had already learned to be a president, he answered in a similar sense.

"No. I knew about the difficulties. It's a big country, Brazil has many vices," he said, adding that he was worried about the violence because "people have to change so as not to be swallowed."

"Bolsonaro: 'I was not born to be president' ... nor to be in the military, according to the evidence." The photo shows a Brazilian newspaper cover whose title reads "Army does not want to have Bolsonaro in his barracks." Oct. 19, 1991. The Terrestrial Operations Command banned Jair Bolsonaro to entry barracks at Rio de Janeiro because the congressman was instigating officers and sergeants with pamphlets."

These odd statements come at a time when many continue their demand for the release of former President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, a leftist leader- who electoral experts argue- would have won the last Brazilian presidential elections if he had not been arbitrarily imprisoned on April 6, 2018.

Bolsonaro's speech also coincides with a growing rejection of his statements of hatred, one of which is the vindication of the 1964 military coup as a sort of "democratic" action.

According to a Datafolha Institute public opinion poll released on Saturday by local media Folha de Sao Paulo, 57 percent of the Brazilian population rejects Bolsonaro's proposal to commemorate the coup.

The data also revealed that the biggest rejection of his comments about the coup and the military dictatorship that followed comes from the youth. Datafolha interviewed 2,086 people in 130 Brazilian cities.

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