Even though he denies the claim, the name of S\u00e3o Paulo governor Tarc\u00edsio\u00a0de Freitas continues to come up as a leading candidate to take Jair Bolsonaro\u2019s place as the leader of Brazil\u2019s right-wing political group.<\/p>\n
While Bolsonaro, 70, focuses on appealing a 27-year sentence for plotting a failed coup,\u00a0Brazil’s conservatives are without a clear candidate for the 2026 election.<\/p>\n
Freitas, a former minister under Bolsonaro, runs a state that is home to 46 million people, the economic powerhouse of the country with a GDP equivalent to that of Belgium or Sweden.<\/p>\n
Polls have shown the former army engineer as the candidate most likely to perform best against leftist President Luiz In\u00e1cio\u00a0Lula da Silva.<\/p>\n
But Freitas \u2013\u00a0a more traditional conservative than the far-right Bolsonaro \u2013\u00a0appears uneasy about being named as a possible contender.<\/p>\n
\u00abJair Bolsonaro is our greatest political leader,\u00bb Freitas has said.<\/p>\n
However, expectations are high that Bolsonaro will appoint a successor. Other potential candidates are said to be his wife, Michelle, or his son, the senator Flavio Bolsonaro.<\/p>\n
Governor Freitas, a supporter of economic efficiency and strong policing, is a technocrat who had not run for office until he won the S\u00e3o Paulo governorship in 2022. His advisors describe him as a pragmatic leader, \u00abunafraid of taking action.\u00bb<\/p>\n
\u00abIf being pragmatic means finding immediate solutions to people’s problems, I agree with that description,\u00bb Freitas told AFP last week.<\/p>\n
\u00a0<\/p>\n
Competent and shrewd<\/strong><\/p>\n Polished and poised with an intense gaze and faint facial scars, the 50-year-old governor comes across as approachable in public, but becomes forceful when speaking at the podium, delivering long streams of memorised statistics.<\/p>\n He is more measured than the firebrand Bolsonaro, yet knows how to match the political moment.<\/p>\n Just before the recent coup verdict, he launched a fierce attack against what he called the Supreme Court’s \u00abdictatorship.\u00bb<\/p>\n Freitas is in favour of a controversial push by Congress to give amnesty to hundreds convicted of coup-related crimes, including Bolsonaro. He has even said that, if president, he would pardon him.<\/p>\n \u00abAmnesty can help pacify the country. Brazil needs it to move forward,\u00bb he said.<\/p>\n Freitas, who was born in Rio de Janeiro, moved to S\u00e3o Paulo to enter the military academy, and retired as a captain at 33 to enter the civil service.<\/p>\n His first major position was as national director of infrastructure and transport under the leftist government of Dilma Rousseff.<\/p>\n Bolsonaro, impressed by his reputation as an efficient technocrat, chose him as infrastructure minister in 2019, later backing his campaign for governor of S\u00e3o Paulo.<\/p>\n \u00abFreitas is competent and quite shrewd,\u00bb a European diplomat told AFP on condition of anonymity. \u00abBut the Bolsonaro base hasn’t disappeared \u2013 as a candidate, he will have to win over the radical wing.\u00bb<\/p>\n Leonardo Paz, a political scientist at the Getulio Vargas Foundation, added: \u00abThe establishment sees him as an effective operator who wouldn’t spark the kind of unnecessary controversy Bolsonaro did.\u00bb<\/p>\n The left meanwhile criticises Freitas for supporting amnesty and not condemning Donald Trump’s steep tariffs on Brazil, imposed in retaliation for Bolsonaro’s conviction.<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n ‘I don’t care’<\/strong><\/p>\n Freitas accuses Lula of putting \u00abideology ahead of the economy, leaving Brazil exposed to fiscal risk with runaway spending that scared off investors.\u00bb<\/p>\n \u00abThere can be no social justice without fiscal responsibility,\u00bb he said.<\/strong><\/p>\n Under his tenure, S\u00e3o Paulo has registered the country’s sharpest rise in police killings.<\/p>\n Deaths from police interventions jumped 61 percent between 2023 and 2024, according to the Brazilian Public Security Forum. The national average fell by 3 percent.<\/p>\n In 2024, two non-governmental organisations (NGOs) accused Freitas of tacitly tolerating police abuses in a submission to the UN Human Rights Council.<\/p>\n The governor’s response was blunt: \u00abI don’t care.\u201d<\/p>\n by Facundo Fern\u00e1ndez Barrio, AFP<\/p>\n \t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/p>\nrelated news<\/h6>\n<\/p>\n<\/section>\n