Former Brazilian president Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva said he would toss his name in the hat a third time if current President Dilma Rousseff decides not to run again.
“The only hypothesis is whether to run for President Dilma does not want (to aim for re-election). I will not allow a toucan (of the opposition party) to return to the presidency of Brazil,” he said during a television interview for the station SBT last night.
Lula was a member of the leftist Workers’ Party, finished his mandate on the 31st of December with a record 80% popularity. Beginning his presidency 1st January 2003 after winning in the 2002 elections, he was not allowed to run for a third consecutive term according to the Brazilian constitution. Rousseff, Brazil’s first female president, is his Workers’ Party successor.
Lula said in the interview that he believes Rousseff will be “very strong” at the end of her mandate, and will want to run again.
“She is not only going to want to search for re-election,” he said, noting he would be a voter “to re-elect her.”
In October 2011, Lula was diagnosed with throat cancer. He announced that the cancer was in remission in March, and at the same time announced that he would be returning to the politic sphere.
“I’m going to return to the political life, because I believe that Brazil has to continue growing, developing, generating employment and bettering the quality of life of the millions and millions of Brazilians who have arrived in the middle class and don’t want to go back down,” he said in a recorded message at the time, according to Argentina’s La Nación.
In addition, the newspaper also reports that a judge of the Supreme Court of Brazil accused the former president this week of try to pressure the court into delaying a trial for corruption charges against the ruling party.
