Cabinet video reveals key clues about Brazilian govt affairs

A video of a Brazilian cabinet meeting that was made public by the supreme court does not provide a smoking gun that would trigger the impeachment of President Jair Bolsonaro, but it does reveal how the administration views the coronavirus pandemic and trading partner China.

The two-hour video of the April 22 meeting was released as part of an inquiry into allegations by former justice minister Sérgio Moro, who resigned from his post in April, that Bolsonaro tried to interfere in federal police investigations.

This interference is supposed to have taken place as one of president's sons, lawmaker Flávio Bolsonaro, is under investigation over alleged wrongdoings when he was a legislator in Rio de Janeiro state.

Jair Bolsonaro, who was elected in 2018 on a platform that included combating corruption, and his son have both denied any illicit activity on multiple occasions.

BNamericas takes a look at the key points that have emerged from the cabinet meeting video regarding domestic issues and international affairs.

COVID-19

Although the meeting took place in April when Brazil was not considered to be an epicenter of the coronavirus pandemic as it is now, the numbers of infected people and fatalities were already showing a worrying upward trend.

However, during the cabinet meeting, Bolsonaro and most of his ministers, as well as the heads of state-run banks also present at the meeting, insisted on downplaying the risk of the pandemic and heavily criticized state governors who adopted partial lockdown measures, particularly the governors of the country's most populous states, São Paulo and Rio de Janeiro.

Along with criticizing the state governors, Bolsonaro called for greater public access to weapons to defend their "rights of free movement."

"Why am I arming the people? Because I don't want a dictatorship," said Bolsonaro.

CHINA

The release of the video also threatens to undermine the relationship between Brazil and its main trade partner, China.

However, some of the talks reinforced the perception that the current administration has a strong bias in favor of the US and is looking to reduce ties with China.

"China is that guy you know you have to tolerate” said Paulo Guedes, the powerful minister of economy, indicating that Brazil is not on entirely friendly terms with the Asian giant.

Certain parts of the video in which references were made to other countries were censored by the supreme court to avoid diplomatic tensions. But there is concern that some of the redacted comments about China could be more inflammatory and may be eventually leaked to China, which would hurt bilateral relations at a time when Brazil needs to boost international trade and also looks to attract Chinese investments to its infrastructure sector.

ENVIRONMENTAL ISSUES

Meanwhile, the environmental approach of Bolsonaro's administration, which has been strongly criticized by global leaders and international companies due to increasing levels of deforestation, have taken some of the spotlight.

Environment minister Ricardo Salles suggested that the government should take advantage of the fact that the press is focusing on COVID-19 to approve measures that increase the areas in forested regions for commercial exploitation and also cut down the bureaucracy involved in environmental permitting.

“We have the chance at this time that the press's attention is almost exclusively dedicated to COVID to approve infra-legal reforms for deregulation, simplification, all reforms," said Salles regarding the country's environmental agenda.

SMALL, MEDIUM-SIZED FIRMS

Although in recent weeks the Brazilian governments has been underlining that it is using state-run banks, mainly BNDES and Caixa Econômica Federal, to support small and medium-sized firms, the cabinet meeting showed that these efforts may be more of a narrative than what is actually happening.

“We're going to make money using public funds to save big companies. Now, we're going to lose money by saving small companies," said Guedes.

Owners of small and medium-sized companies in Brazil formed a strong base of support for Bolsonaro's election, as he used his political campaign to claim that his agenda would involve reducing bureaucracy, helping these kinds of firms, so it remains to be seen what kind of backlash this will cause among his supporters.