Author Mario Vargas Llosa backs Bolsonaro over Lula in Brazil election

The Nobel prize-winning writer Mario Vargas Llosa, Latin America’s most outstanding residing chronicler of energy and corruption, has declared a choice for Jair Bolsonaro over Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva as Brazil prepares to go to the polls later this yr.

The 86-year-old Peruvian author, who additionally holds Spanish citizenship, revealed his ideas on October’s election throughout a chat in Uruguay on Wednesday.

“The Bolsonaro case is a very difficult one,” he advised an viewers in Montevideo. “Bolsonaro’s clowning around is very difficult for a liberal to accept. But now, between Bolsonaro and Lula, I of course prefer Bolsonaro. Even with Bolsonaro’s foolishness, he’s not Lula.”

The author, who was crushed to the Peruvian presidency in 1990 by Alberto Fujimori, mentioned Lula was regarded fondly in Europe regardless of having been convicted “of being a thief”. The controversial corruption fees to which Vargas Llosa referred had been annulled final yr.

His assist for Bolsonaro, nevertheless, was removed from uncritical when it got here to the president’s assaults on Covid vaccines. “It’s insane, it’s absurd to oppose [them] in the way he has,” Vargas Llosa mentioned. “It seems absolutely irresponsible to me.”

It shouldn’t be the primary time the novelist has thrown his weight behind a rightwing candidate. A couple of months earlier than the second spherical of final yr’s presidential election in Peru, Vargas Llosa put aside a long time of lacerating criticism of the Fujimori political dynasty when he known as on voters to assist his former foe’s daughter Keiko moderately than her far-left opponent, Pedro Castillo, who nonetheless prevailed.

“Peruvians should vote for Keiko Fujimori because she represents the lesser of two evils, and if she’s in power there are more possibilities of saving our democracy,” he wrote in his column in Spain’s El País.

In 2009 Alberto Fujimori – whose time as president was marked by Shining Path terrorism, financial upheaval and political corruption – was given a 25-year jail sentence for authorising loss of life squads and presiding over rampant graft and vote-rigging.

When neighbouring Chile voted in its final-round presidential election final December, Vargas Llosa backed the ultra-conservative José Antonio Kast over the leftwing Gabriel Boric, the eventual winner.

The political scientist Daniel V Guisado famous that the novelist had additionally supported unsuccessful candidates in Spain, Argentina and Bolivia in current years. “Getting Vargas Llosa’s backing is the biggest political tombstone of the last century,” Guisado tweeted, including: “Congratulations to Lula.”

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Vargas Llosa, who has drifted additional to the appropriate with age, induced a stir in October final yr when he mentioned voting the appropriate manner in elections was extra essential than having free elections.

“Latin America will undoubtedly emerge from [a very difficult situation] when Latin Americans discover that they’ve voted badly,” he advised the nationwide conference of Spain’s conservative People’s occasion. “The important thing in elections isn’t that there’s freedom in those elections; it’s voting well – and voting well is something that’s very important because countries that vote badly, as has happened in some Latin American countries, pay dearly for it.”

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