By Lisandra Paraguassu
SÃO PAULO (Reuters) – After being elected president of Brazil for the third time, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva still remains a mystery about who will be part of his government team, but trusted names like Alexandre Padilha, Fernando Haddad, Wellington Dias, and Flavio Dino, in addition to more recent allies, but essential to the campaign, such as Simone Tebet and Marina Silva, have practically guaranteed places in the top tier.
Possibly, within these PT names, the answer to the most constant question to Lula since the beginning of his campaign will be: who will be his finance minister. But, according to sources interviewed by Reuters, this is a subject that Lula does not even deal with those closest to him.
“He banned this debate, and he is right. In a tight election, anything that anticipates sounds very bad”, said a PT member very close to the president-elect.
The names circulating for the position include federal deputy Alexandre Padilha, senator-elect Wellington Dias, former governor of Piauí, former mayor of São Paulo Fernando Haddad –defeated on Sunday in the election for the state government– and the former governor of São Paulo. -Minister of Finance of Temer Henrique Meirelles, who recently reconnected with Lula.
However, guarantee the sources, the bets are only made based on recent movements of the campaign, without any clear indication of Lula.
“Nothing has changed in the last month. There isn’t a more popular name at the moment, it’s all speculation because whoever decides still doesn’t say anything”, says a source from the campaign’s economic area.
The name of Alexandre Padilha has been appearing more recently because the deputy has been a constant presence at dinners and lunches with businessmen and representatives of the financial market to talk about Lula’s proposals. This same role has been played a few times by Wellington Dias.
According to a source, however, Padilha would be more quoted at the moment for the Civil House.
One of the names most feared by the financial market, the coordinator of Lula’s government program, Aloizio Mercadante, should be in the ministry, but not in the Treasury, says a second source.
“It will not be a central ministry like Finance or Civil House. I would bet maybe on Planning”, said the source.
In addition to the economic team, some names are taken for granted, but only one has been mentioned by Lula himself: Flávio Dino, former governor of Maranhão, senator-elect. Today, one of PT’s trusted men will possibly be the Minister of Justice.
Senator Simone Tebet, even without being nominated, is a guaranteed figure in the first rank. The emedebista entered the PT campaign headfirst in the second round, conquering space and the heart of Lula.
The bet is that the senator will occupy the Ministry of Agriculture, since she comes from a state, Mato Grosso do Sul, with strong roots in agribusiness. However, she herself has already hinted more than once that she would like to take up Education.
“The first word I spoke to Lula when we met was education,” he said recently at a lunch with business supporters of Lula before a walk through Faria Lima.
The senator’s desire comes up against a traditional PT behavior, which usually reserves areas such as Education, Health, Social Development and Human Rights to itself.
The elected federal deputy Marina Silva (Rede) can also leave the Chamber of Deputies to take up a position that has yet to be created, that of the National Authority against Climate Change, which would work in all areas of the government to implement the changes for the green economy that Lula wants to head.
The sources interviewed by Reuters agree that Marina, Minister of the Environment in the first five years of the Lula government, would not return to the government for the same position, but admit that she would possibly accept to occupy the position that she herself defends exists – in an interview, she left that open door.
Another person who would not refuse an eventual call from Lula to return to the government is former foreign minister Celso Amorim, who occupied the Itamaraty during Lula’s first two terms and continues to be his main adviser on international relations.
“I have no ambitions in this regard, but I cannot refuse a summons from President Lula,” the diplomat told Reuters two weeks ago. In Lula’s campaign nucleus, the assessment is that, if Amorim wants to, he will return to the ministry.
Other names that, according to the sources, could make up the new government are Senator Randolfe Rodrigues (Rede-AP), one of the key names in the articulations that made up the wide network of support between Lula and Senator Jaques Wagner.
The list, however, did not yet include the necessary negotiation with the parties that supported Lula since the first round and that should be contemplated in some way – in all, the PT gathered 10 acronyms around his candidacy.
“Many people who think they are going to be a minister will not be. Others that no one thinks about must appear. Lula has been saying that she wants to renew a lot,” says one of the sources.
(Reporting by Lisandra Paraguassu. Edited by Flávia Marreiro)
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