Argentine VP posts cryptic entry on social media after Bolsonaro’s sentencing
Villarruel never mentioned Bolsonaro by name, leaving her followers guessing what she meant exactly
Following the conviction of former Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro, Argentine Vice President Victoria Villarruel posted a message on social media stating, It is disturbing that in America, democratically elected presidents end up in prison.
While she did not explicitly mention Bolsonaro, her comment was widely interpreted as an expression of support for the retired Army captain. Villarruel’s remarks sparked a debate on social media, with many users interpreting her words in different ways, including a potential reference to other convicted leaders in the region, such as former Argentine President Cristina Fernández de Kirchner (CFK).
Bolsonaro is the third former Brazilian president to be convicted, following Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva and Fernando Collor de Mello, adding to a growing list of leaders in the Americas who have faced legal and judicial consequences after leaving office, like the late Alberto Fujimori, or Pedro Castillo, Ollanta Humala, and Alejandro Toledo, all of them in Peru, where Martín Vizcarra was recently released pending a trial.
Strangely enough, Argentine President Javier Milei, perhaps fearing legal consequences for his social media postings, such as the one in the $LIBRA scandal, made no immediate comments about his ideological ally, whom he welcomed at his inauguration on Dec. 10, 2023, as if he were still a sitting head of State.
Bolsonaro was sentenced to 27 years in jail for conspiracy against the democratic order for the Jan. 8, 2023, uprisings in Brasilia, just one week after Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva took office following his runoff win. A Chamber of Brazil’s Supreme Federal Court (STF) found by 4 votes to 1 that what the Bolsonarista groups did was an attempted coup d’état.
Villarruel’s accession to the political fray came through condemning the Argentine Judiciary for not convicting the guerrillas of the 1970s, as it did the military officers fighting them through illegal methods. Villarruel’s late father was an Army commando who participated in the fight against leftist guerrillas in the early 170s (under a democratic government) and was later deployed to the Falkland/Malvinas Islands in 1982.
Lula, who is currently serving his third term after governing Brazil between 2003 and 2010, had received two convictions for corruption linked to construction companies in Operation Lava Jato: in 2017 (seven years in prison) and in 2019 (twelve years). Both were reviewed by higher courts and finally overturned in 2021 due to procedural errors. He was imprisoned for 580 days at the Federal Police headquarters in Curitiba and regained his freedom in November 2019.
Collor de Melo (1990-1992) was sentenced in 2023 to eight years and ten months in prison for corruption and money laundering in the embezzlement of funds from the state oil company BR. Due to his age (76) and health problems, the Court granted him house arrest, which he has been serving since April at his mansion in Maceió.
Other cases in the Americas include Álvaro Uribe in Colombia, Rafael Correa in Ecuador, Mauricio Funes and Antonio Saca in El Salvador, Ricardo Martinelli in Panama, and Otto Pérez in Guatemala.
