Government takes a false step by anticipating Lira’s succession – 06/28/2023 – Bruno Boghossian

Lula decided to jump on Arthur Lira’s boat three months before the election for the presidency of the Chamber. The petista did the math and realized that he was far from the necessary support to place a candidate aligned with the government. To avoid a premature clash with the centrão, he closed support for the re-election of the leader of the group.

More than a year and a half before a new election for the command of the House, the government blinked once more. The Minister of the Civil House, Rui Costa, sent Lira the sign of an agreement to support the name chosen by the President of the Chamber to succeed him in 2025. The favorite is Elmar Nascimento, leader of União Brasil.

The logic of the Planalto is the same: Lula still does not have a majority, and the centrão plays hard to support the government. Sealing an alliance could calm the plenary and convince Lira’s class to be friendlier right now.

On the counters of Congress, the reasoning seems to make sense. But Planalto made a mistake with the early offer. The movement takes the government out of the game, keeps the centrão with a monopoly on the plenary session and risks tying Lula to the Lira project without it being known how strong the mayor will be until then (the PF is keeping an eye on him, and the centrão has its internal divisions).

With the gesture, the government practically says that the centrão will be able to dominate political operations in the Chamber until the end of Lula’s term, as long as it offers some goodwill to the PT. The agreement looks more like a capitulation than an alliance, since it keeps the Planalto as the weakest part of the relationship.

The nod even increases the leverage of Lira’s group and threatens to send the government to a tougher negotiating table than the current one. Elmar, by the way, is one of the main pressure operators for the transfer from the Ministry of Health to the center.

It is possible that the government is just playing a game to postpone discussions on Lira’s succession, but the centrão already considers that there is a signed commitment. If Planalto changes its mind, it will now have created a problem for 2025.

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