Judges who suspend their vacation to prevent another judge from voting according to his conscience is something unheard of in Brazil. But the novelty has been the mark of the situation of former President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, who was imprisoned three months ago at the Federal Police Superintendency in the city of Curitiba.
Accused by the mainstream Brazilian media and condemned without evidence to incriminate him, he is the candidate that most of the Brazilian people want to see competing in the presidential elections scheduled for November. If they happened today, Lula would be elected in the first round. And that’s why he’s still imprisoned.
The balance of today’s legal war and the decisions that were taken by judges shaken in their rest will only be realized during the week or longer time. But there is no longer any way to hide that the Judiciary in this process plays a political role, allowing the judge to become an accuser.
Brazil sees the lawsuit involving former President Lula as a duel fought with him by Judge Sérgio Moro, head of Operation Lavajato, who led to Lula’s conviction. What has not yet become clear to the population is that the judge’s role is to judge rather than persecute.
On Sunday, the persecution was overturned. Sergio Moro was on vacation in Portugal, with no further links to the current Lula’s case, when Judge Rogerio “Favreto” of the Federal Regional Court of the 4th Region in Porto Alegre granted a habeas corpus to the former president. Without the modesty of a magistrate of first instance, Moro called and advised agents of the Federal Police to break the order of release from Favreto, judge of second instance, superior to his, therefore.
Refuted in his meddling by Judge Favreto, who reiterated the order of release of the former president, Moro was rescued by other magistrates, who were also on leave, and who at the end of a day of judicial war, opted to defy the positions of the colleague Rogério Favreto – the only one on that day with the assignment to decide.
What happened to the Brazilian Judiciary this Sunday was a confession aside, with the demonstration of a desperate collusion to maintain the coup applied in Brazil in 2016. Because the liberation of Lula would mean this: to interrupt a process of assault on the country that began with the plot for the overthrow of Dilma Rousseff.
At that time, the audio leaked from a conversation between the articulators of the coup detailed how this would be: through a great deal with the Judiciary – beyond the media and the Parliament. The history of these times in Brazil will not be able to get rid of those recorded words about the combined coup “with the High Court, with all”.