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Brazilian president, Jair Bolsonaro, assured Thursday that Colombians will begin to leave their country after the triumph of socialist Gustavo Petro in the elections held last Sunday.
“Colombia has just elected an M19 guerrilla, similar to Dilma Rousseff,” former president of Brazil who was also a militant in guerrilla groups in her youth, Bolsonaro told supporters at the gates of his official residence in Brasilia.
“What is the most sought-after public service in that country?”, Bolsonaro asked those listening to him about Colombia, immediately answering: “The passport sector.”
Bolsonaro also commented on Petro’s request, after his victory at the polls, for the release of young people arrested for acts of violence during the violent protests that were recorded in several Colombian cities last year.
“He is going to release all the young people. Generally, those who are involved in drug trafficking are people of that age group, even minors,” said the Brazilian leader, whose government congratulated Petro on his victory on Tuesday, through a note released by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs.
Bolsonaro linked his criticisms of Petro with those he maintains against other countries governed by leftist leaders, whom he associated with former Brazilian president Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva.
“In Venezuela, they grab three bags of money and go buy bread. See how Venezuela, Argentina, Chile, Colombia or Cuba are doing,” said Bolsonaro, who maintained that the leaders of those countries and Lula “are all from the Sao Paulo Forum,” which groups Latin American leftist parties.
In a veiled reference to next October’s elections in Brazil, in which he aspires to renew his mandate despite the fact that all polls show Lula as clear favorite, he reiterated a “warning” to Brazilians in relation to those elections.
“We are the ones responsible for our acts and omissions,” declared Bolsonaro, who insisted that Brazil is “threatened” by a “return of communism,” which in his opinion is embodied in the country by Lula and the socialist parties that support him.
