RIO DE JANEIRO: Right-winger Jair Bolsonaro and leftist candidate Fernando Haddad, who will contest a second-round runoff to become Brazil’s next president, hold diametrically opposed visions of Brazil’s future.
Here is a glance at their key policy differences:
Economy
BOLSONARO: Reduce public debt by 20 per cent through a raft of privatisation and the sale of state properties.
— Create a parallel private pension system.
— Reduce the number of ministries: “the country will work better with fewer ministries.” His chief economic adviser, banker Paulo Guedes, would lead an Economy superministry with responsibility for finance, planning and trade.
— Redistribute the “tax burden so that those who pay a lot pay less and those who evade and hide pay more.”
HADDAD: Unfreeze public spending and make labour legislation more flexible, reversing current government policy.
— Block privatisation moves.
— Use an employment drive and a crackdown on tax evasion to finance an overhaul of the costly pensions system.
Security
BOLSONARO: Loosen gun laws. “Guns are tools that can be used to kill or to save lives. It depends on who’s using them.”
. Lower the age of criminal responsibility to 16.
. Boost police legal protection when using guns.
. Categorise invasions of property and homes as “terrorism.”
HADDAD: Wants to boost gun control measures and closer tracking of the movement of weapons.
. “The current policy of repressing drugs is wrong.” Brazil should explore “decriminalisation and regulation of the drugs trade”.
Corruption
BOLSONARO: “We want a decent, different government from all those that have plunged us into an ethical, moral and budgetary crisis.”
HADDAD: Backs greater transparency in the fight against corruption and says campaigning against corruption “cannot serve to criminalise politics.”
Diplomacy
BOLSONARO: “We are going to stop hailing murderous dictatorships” — said in reference to Venezuela — “and denigrating big democracies like the United States, Italy and Israel.”
His programme makes no mention of four-nation South American trade bloc Mercosur, of which Brazil is a key member. Instead, it emphasises bilateral ties and pacts.
HADDAD: “Brazil must resume and deepen Latin American integration” and strengthen ties with Africa. Deplores “the politics of intervention and the use of strength” to resolve international disputes.
Education
BOLSONARO: “School programmes and teaching methods need to change. There needs to be more mathematics, more sciences and Portuguese. Without indoctrination or early sexualisation.”
HADDAD: “Based on the constitutional principle of a secular state, we will promote comprehensive health for women for the full exercise of sexual and reproductive rights and will strengthen an inclusive, non-sexist, non-racist and non-discriminatory view of the LGBT” community.
Abortion
BOLSONARO: His programme doesn’t mention it, but he has promised to veto any move to ease Brazil’s restrictive abortion laws. In the country, terminating pregnancies is permitted only in cases of rape, where the mother’s health is in danger, or severe brain malformation in the foetus.
HADDAD: The PT programme makes no reference to abortion either. Haddad said in 2012 he was “personally against” the legalisation of abortion, but called for “establishing public policies that offer women the conditions to plan their lives.”
— Haddad’s running mate, Manuela D’Avila, of the Communist Party of Brazil, is in favour of making abortion legal.
LGBTI
BOLSONARO: Bolsonaro’s programme makes no mention to LGBTI (Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender and Intersexual) rights. Several of his statements were openly homophobic.
— During the campaign he tried to soften his tone. In one radio interview he said: “Homosexuals will be happy if I am president.”
HADDAD: The Haddad programme has a chapter devoted to LGBT right which proposes “criminizaling LGBTI phobia”.
Environment
BOLSONARO: Reflecting his backing from the powerful large-scale farming lobby in congress, Bolsonaro plans to merge the Agriculture and Environment ministries, and his manifesto makes no mention of deforestation or global warming.
HADDAD: He intends to reach “a zero rate of deforestation by 2022, without reducing agricultural production” thanks to “more efficient” use of land.
— He also proposes measures to “contain global warming”
— AFP
