The government of Jair Bolsonaro (PL) decided not to send any representatives to the inauguration of leftist Xiomara Castro in Honduras later this month. She was elected president of the Central American country in November.
According to Itamaraty interlocutors, the formal message inviting Bolsonaro to the inauguration of Xiomara – the wife of former President Manuel Zelaya – was delivered last week. The two Honduran leaders have historical ties to the PT.
Also for this reason, from the outset, the participation of the Brazilian president himself in the event was ruled out, but there was a discussion about the possibility of sending some representation at ministerial level or deputy Hamilton Mourão (PRTB).
In a show of detachment, the government decided not to send any authority from Brasília to Tegucigalpa. Behind the scenes, this is treated as a political decision that is unlikely to be reversed until January 27, the date of celebrations in the Honduran capital.
If it is confirmed, the country should have a formal representation, limited to the presence of the Brazilian ambassador to Honduras, Breno da Costa.
According to the EFE news agency, in addition to the formal message to Bolsonaro, the president-elect of Honduras sent invitations to Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva and Dilma Rousseff, both from the PT. Interlocutors of the two former presidents said that they are not expected to go to Tegucigalpa.
In the Lula government, after being deposed by a coup in late 2009, Zelaya spent four months as a refugee in the Brazilian embassy. After a period in exile in Nicaragua, the Honduran returned to the country in 2011, when he founded Libertad y Refundación, the party for which his wife ran for president.
The couple also have ties to the Venezuelan dictator, Nicolás Maduro, from whom he takes inspiration for projects against inequality – Chavismo supported Zelaya when he was deposed and campaigned for the restitution of his power.
Xiomara was elected in November with 51.1% of the vote, 14 points ahead of second-placed rightist Nasry Asfura, supported by current president Juan Orlando Hernández. JOH ends his second term involved in allegations of drug trafficking in the United States — he denies any wrongdoing — and with speculation that he may take refuge in Nicaragua.
By not sending representatives from Brasilia to Honduras, Bolsonaro must repeat what he did in the recent inauguration of another leader of the Latin American left. In November 2020, at the inauguration ceremony of Luis Arce in Bolivia, Brazil was represented only by the ambassador in La Paz, Octávio Côrtes.
There were also frictions with Brazil’s main trading partner on the continent. In December 2019, after threatening not to dispatch an emissary or to be represented by the then Minister of Citizenship, Osmar Terra, the president chose Mourão to attend the inauguration of Alberto Fernández in Argentina.
In both the Bolivian and Argentine cases, the Itamaraty was commanded by Ernesto Araújo, one of the main exponents of the government’s ideological wing.
His replacement, Carlos França, acted to get Brazil to send representatives to the inauguration in Peru of Pedro Castillo, also from the left. At the time, he accompanied Mourão in the delegation.
This week, at another ceremony in Central America, dictator Daniel Ortega began his fourth consecutive term in Nicaragua, after winning sham elections in November. Brazil also had no formal representative.
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