Africa-Press – Mauritius. Five judges sitting on Brazil’s highest electoral court delivered judgement last Friday 30th June barring former Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro from running for office again until 2030 after they found that he ‘abused his power and cast unfounded doubts on the country’s electronic voting system’.
The judges agreed that ‘Bolsonaro used government communication channels to promote his campaign and sowed distrust about the vote’. Two judges voted against.
News agencies report that the case focused on a July 18, 2022, meeting where Bolsonaro used government staffers, the state television channel and the presidential palace in Brasilia to tell foreign ambassadors that the country’s electronic voting system was rigged. In her decisive vote that formed a majority, Judge Carmen Lucia said ‘the facts are incontrovertible’.
The Bolsonaro case (also commented by Jan Arden on Page 3) marks the first time a president has been suspended for election violations rather than a criminal offence; it removes the former president from the 2024 and 2028 municipal elections as well as the 2026 general elections; the latter also faces other legal troubles, including criminal investigations.
Future criminal convictions could extend his ban by years and subject him to imprisonment. The Brazilian electoral court judgement could be seen to have been come rather fortuitously in light of the case opposing Suren Dayal to Pravind Jugnauth (and seven others) that will be heard by the Law Lords of the Privy Council next Monday 10th July.
Suren Dayal challenges the election of Pravind Jugnauth and his two other running candidates, Leela Devi Dookun-Luchoomun and Yogita Sawmynaden to the National Assembly of Mauritius ‘on the grounds of bribery, treating, and undue influence’.
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