Lula says that the country cannot be hostage to Campos Neto – 03/02/2023 – Market

President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva (PT) again criticized, this Thursday (2), the president of the Central Bank, Roberto Campos Neto, saying that the country cannot be his hostage.

The statements by the Chief Executive come after the release of the GDP (Gross Domestic Product) accumulated in 2022, calculated by the IBGE (Brazilian Institute of Geography and Statistics). In the fourth quarter, the result decreased by 0.2%.

“Well, why does this citizen, who was not elected for anything, think he has the power to decide things and still ‘I’m going to think about how I can help Brazil’? No, you don’t have to think about how to help Brazil, you you just have to think about how to reduce the interest rate so that this country has credit again, for the economy to work again, that’s what you have to do”, said Lula, in an interview with journalist Reinaldo Azevedo, on BandNews.

“And this is not my bravado because I have no interest in fighting with the president of the Central Bank. The only thing I think is the following: this country cannot be hostage to a single man”, he added.

Since the Central Bank decided to maintain the interest rate at 13.75%, a crisis began between the head of the monetary authority and the head of the Executive. Lula’s allies advised him to cease the attacks, which they did for a few days.

The assessment, both in the government and among allies in Congress, is that the interest rate is too high. Lula said, repeatedly during the interview, that he did not understand what justifies this level.

“The GDP for the last quarter came out, it is negative, so the Brazilian economy did not grow last year. Despite Guedes’ fanfare, it did not grow. So, you have an economy that is not growing, you have unemployment that is with informal employment with workers earning terribly badly because the salary mass has dropped a lot, you don’t have credit, credit is scarce and soon you will have a credit crisis.

On the other hand, while the petista has already criticized the BC’s autonomy several times, this time he said “no care a lot about this thing“.

At the beginning of last month, Lula started a new front of pressure on the Central Bank by asking for the vigilance of the agents who can act to dismiss Campos Neto.

Lula stated that the Senate, which may approve the dismissal of the president of the Central Bank after the government’s request, should monitor the performance of the autarchy.

His speeches critical of Campos Neto and BC had a negative impact on the financial market. In an interview with BandNews this Thursday, he downplayed: “I was beaten by Faria Lima, because Faria Lima earns a lot with high interest rates, she lives off of that”.