PT Statement: Against a political cassation, with Lula to the end
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Faced with the violence committed today, August 31, by the Superior Electoral Court (TSE) against the rights of Lula and the people who want to elect him president of the Republic, the Workers’ Party affirms that we will continue to fight by all means to guarantee his candidacy in the elections on 7 October.
We will present all the appeals to the courts so that the political rights of Lula, as provided by national law and international treaties ratified by Brazil, are recognized. Let’s defend Lula in the streets, along with people, because he is the candidate of hope.
It is a lie that the Lei da Ficha Limpa (Clean Registry Act) would prevent the candidacy of those who were convicted in second instance, as is Lula’s unfair situation. Article 26-C of this Act says that ineligibility may be suspended when there is a plausible appeal to be tried. And Lula has appeals in the STJ and in the STF against the arbitrary sentence.
It is a lie that Lula could not participate in the election because he is in prison. Article 16-A of the Electoral Law provides that a candidate under judgment may “carry out all acts relating to the electoral campaign, including using free election time on radio and television and having his name kept in the electronic ballot box “.
The Electoral Court has recognized the rights provided in these two laws to dozens of candidates in recent elections. In 2016, 145 mayoral candidates ran under judgment, with registration refused, and 98 were elected and governed their cities. Is it only for Lula that the law is not valid?
The UN Human Rights Committee has determined to Brazil to guarantee Lula’s political rights, including that of being candidate. And Brazil has an obligation to comply because the country has signed the Optional Protocol to the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights. And the National Congress passed the Legislative Decree 311, which recognizes the authority of the Committee. The TSE has no authority to deny an international treaty that Brazil has signed sovereignly.
It is false to argue that the TSE would have to decide on Lula’s registration before electoral campaign, as Minister Barroso claimed. The deadlines were run over in order to exclude Lula. They are arbitrary as they generate legal uncertainty. There is a legal system for the powerful and an exception system for citizen Lula.
In a week that will shame the Judiciary forever, its summit negotiated a 16.4% increase in the already indecent salaries of ministers and judges, sanctioned the criminal outsourcing of labor contracts and now has frontally attacked democracy, the rights of voters and the rights of the country’s largest political leader. It is a political cassation, based on lies and arbitrariness, as it was done during the dictatorship.
The violence practiced today exposes Brazil to the world as a country that does not respect its own laws, that does not fulfill its international commitments, that manipulates the judicial system, in complicity with the media, to make political persecution. This system of power, strongly supported by Rede Globo, led the country to the backwardness and people to the suffering and brought the hunger back.
The candidacy of comrade Lula is the response of the Brazilian people to the powerful that have usurped power. Lula, and everything he represents, is above casuisms, judicial maneuvers, and persecution of the powerful.
It is with the people and with Lula that we will fight to the end.
Free Lula!
Lula Candidate!
Lula President!