Bolsonaro’s Dangerous Clowning in Brasilia Bakery

HAVANA TIMES – Brazilian president Jair Bolsonaro had coffee and pastry at a bakery in the capital Brasilia on Thursday evening and his son Edwardo made a short video of the visit, reported dpa news.

In the video (below), the president, known as the Brazilian Trump, can be seen eating, drinking and being photographed with several people standing right next to him. While some of those in the film are wearing face masks, Bolsonaro is not.

Under local restrictions to stem the pandemic, bakeries in the capital are currently only allowed to sell their products for take-out, the news portal G1 said. However that’s not what’s seen in the video.

According to G1, Bolsonaro was also seen among crowds on Friday in Brasilia. Some residents protested against the president by standing at their windows and banging loudly on pots.

Brazilians have been protesting in this way against what they regard as Bolsonaro’s lax and dangerous handling of the coronavirus pandemic for more than two weeks.

Although he had recently dampened his rhetoric, Bolsonaro had made headlines by trivializing the coronavirus as a minor flu and calling for a “return to normality.”

Late Friday, Brazil became the first country in Latin America to have confirmed more than 1,000 coronavirus deaths.

According to the latest figures from the Ministry of Health, the number of deaths has reached 1,056. Almost 20,000 infections have now been registered.

On February 26, the first coronavirus case in Latin America was confirmed in Brazil.

In the intervening weeks Bolsonaro has caused controversy for downplaying the threat.

Twitter deleted two videos that Bolsonaro had published at the end of March. They also showed him drawing crowds and contradicting the recommendations of his own health minister.

Twitter said it bans content that contradicts health information from official bodies and exposes people to a greater risk of infection with the coronavirus.