President changes exterior for electoral roadmap with emphasis on the Northeast

President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva will resume domestic travel, starting this week, with a route through the Northeast. Although the official discourse is that municipal elections are not linked to the dispute for the federal government, Lula himself set the tone for the clash by saying that this year's duel will once again be between him and former president Jair Bolsonaro.

After visiting 24 countries in 2023, carrying in his luggage the motto “Brazil is back”, Lula will now travel national roads using the “people like us” style that marked his last campaigns. The idea of ​​starting the tour in the Northeast has a symbolism: it was in that region that the PT member obtained his biggest advantage over Bolsonaro, with 12.5 million votes ahead.

In addition to 2024 being an election year, in which the government needs to race against time to “make deliveries”, surveys commissioned to measure the president's evaluation, at the end of last year, raised the alarm at Palácio do Planalto. Not without reason: for the majority of those interviewed – even those who voted for the PT -, Lula should travel less abroad and take more care of the country's problems.

“I traveled a lot in 2023. But you knew I was going to travel because it was necessary to recover Brazil's image,” he said on December 20, at the last ministerial meeting of the year.

Offensive

The strategy outlined by the Executive now foresees an offensive that includes inaugurations of the Growth Acceleration Program (PAC) and Minha Casa, Minha Vida housing complexes to new attempts at rapprochement with segments refractory to the PT, such as the evangelical public.

In December, for example, advertisements for Bolsa Família, included in the “Brazil is one people” campaign, used religious expressions along the lines of “Glória be Deus”. The initiative was criticized by evangelical leaders, who saw the film as a stereotypical concept of Christians.

'Contaminated'

Behind closed doors, Lula also asked ministers to travel to medium-sized cities, with more than 100,000 voters, and not just stay in the capitals. The order is to present the government's investments in each region and give interviews to local radio and TV, where the news tends to be less “contaminated” by scandals in Brasília.

Planalto and the PT's Electoral Working Group (GTE) mapped municipalities considered “crown jewels”, which have great potential for votes and are hubs for transmitting information.

This Thursday, the 18th, Lula will go to Salvador and Paulo Afonso (BA). In the capital, he will sign a partnership agreement to set up the Bahia Aerospace Technological Center. On the same trip, the president will inaugurate the Federal University of Vale do São Francisco (Univasf), in Paulo Afonso and will then visit the Abreu e Lima refinery in Ipojuca (PE).

On Friday, the 19th, Lula will give a nod to the Armed Forces when he participates in the ceremony to exchange the Northeast Military Command, in Recife (PE). He will then embark for Fortaleza (CE), where he will lay the foundation stone for the Aeronautics Technological Institute (ITA) campus.

G-20

While government allies set up their municipal platforms, Lula's assistants in Planalto say that, in 2024, the international agenda will land in Brazil because of the G-20.

There will be more than 120 meetings of the group of the largest economies in the world. The meetings will take place in 13 cities until the Summit of Heads of State and Government in Rio de Janeiro, in November, the month in which Brazil will pass the baton of the bloc's presidency.

The information is from the newspaper The State of S. Paulo.