Thousands of supporters of Brazil’s defeated right-wing president Jair Bolsonaro stormed Congress, the supreme court and the presidential palace on Sunday, creating a crisis for new leftist leader Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva just a week into his presidency.
Social media footage showed crowds of people vandalizing the interiors of three institutions in Brasília in scenes reminiscent of the invasion of the US Capitol two years ago by supporters of former president Donald Trump.
Wearing yellow and green Brazilian flags, the demonstrators demanded that Lula’s election victory be annulled.
While the building is unoccupied, the breach will raise questions about the security of Brazil’s political and judicial institutions. The incident will also present a difficult choice for Lula, who took the presidency promising to unite the nation but will now face pressure to undermine Bolsonaro’s radical supporters.
Protesters clashed with police after storming the Planalto presidential palace © AP
“There is no precedent in the history of our country for what these people did. They must be punished. And we will find out who is the funder of these vandals,” said Lula, who was outside the capital on Sunday, visiting a city in the state São Paulo was hit by floods.
“They will all pay with the force of law for this irresponsible act, this anti-democratic act, this vandal and fascist act.”
Television footage showed police firing stun grenades and using pepper spray at protesters, who stormed barricades and set up ramps to the roof of parliament, along with the building’s magnificent white double dome.
The incident came after protesters descended on the capital on Sunday.
Questions will be asked of the new defense minister, José Múcio Monteiro, for his soft treatment of activists who refused to accept Bolsonaro’s defeat and have spent months camping outside military bases across the country calling for a coup. He claimed without evidence that the vote was rigged and accused the top judges of political bias and censorship.
“This absurd attempt to impose will by force will not win,” Flavio Dino, Brazil’s minister of justice and public security, said Friday night when the police tried to remove the site.
Bolsonaro supporters wave the Brazilian national flag from a window after storming the Planalto presidential palace © AP
Lawmakers and prominent Lula allies condemned the move as an attack on democracy.
Rodrigo Pacheco, the speaker of the senate, posted on social media: “I strongly reject this anti-democratic act, which must quickly face the force of law.”
Gleisi Hoffman, president of Lula’s Workers’ Party, accused the authorities responsible for public security in the federal district, where Brasília is located, of irresponsibility.
“This is a declared crime against democracy, against the will of the polls and other interests. [The] the governor and security secretary are responsible for what happened,” he wrote on Twitter.
Shortly after the attack, the governor of Brasília announced that his secretary in charge of security had been fired.
Bolsonaro broke with tradition by not attending Lula’s inauguration last week, instead traveling to Florida.
Like his former US counterpart Trump, Bolsonaro has long raised doubts about the integrity of Brazil’s electronic voting system. His political party launched a legal challenge to annul the rejected election results.
The former president has yet to comment on the attack. Valdemar Costa Neto, head of Bolsonaro’s Liberal party, said the rioters “do not represent Bolsonaro”.
Additional reporting by Carolina Ingizza