Nidae KashmirBrasilia: A majority of Brazil’s Supreme Court confirmed on Thursday a decision to annul criminal convictions against former President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, teeing up a presidential run against current President Jair Bolsonaro in 2022.
The decision, which was widely expected, came after Supreme Court Justice Edson Fachin determined in early March that the lower federal court where Lula has tried lacked jurisdiction, a ruling that was quickly appealed by Brazil’s top prosecutor.
Lula, 75, governed Latin America’s biggest country and largest economy between 2003 and 2011, overseeing a commodities boom that turbocharged economic growth.
In 2018, he was convicted of taking bribes from engineering firms in return for public contracts and spent a year and a half behind bars, until the Supreme Court ruled he and others could appeal their cases without serving time.
