The president of Brazil, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silvaunderwent a second surgical operation this Thursday to prevent new hemorrhages in the back of the head where he was hit a few weeks ago during a domestic accident.
The doctors, who previously detailed what “relatively simple” what the operation was, they have reported after it that President Lula is “super stable” and it is still expected that he will be discharged from the hospital next week.
“The president is awake in the ICU, is already eating, is super stable (…) Depending on the president’s evolution, he should receive discharge at the beginning of the week“, said his personal doctor, Roberto Kalil Filho.
“After being discharged from the hospital, the president will be able to go to Brasilia on Monday or Tuesday,” Kalil said. “From the presidential palace he will be able to resume his work agenda. You will be able to gradually resume your normal activity.”
The minimally invasive operation was performed early this Thursday, after he underwent another one on Monday resulting from the accident he suffered in October, when he slipped in the bathtub of the bathroom of the official residence.
The personal doctor of the Brazilian president, Kalil Filho, has indicated that this Thursday’s operation it was already planned and is a continuation of the first. The day before, Lula da Silva was “lucid” and “conversing,” while he spent the day “without complications” in the intensive care unit.
During the press conference, Lula’s doctors added that, before this week’s operation, the president had a fever and flu symptoms.
Some Brazilian media have focused on the state of health and the advanced age of the president, who will turn 81 in 2026, the date on which he plans to run for re-election. The Minister of Social Communication, Paulo Pimentathis Thursday refuted the criticism and stressed that he is fit to present himself.
With Lula in the hospital, he is the vice president Geraldo Alckmin who will continue to be in charge of directing the commitments planned in the Brazilian president’s agenda, although he will not assume his duties on an interim basis.
The vice president “He will replace the president, in case of impediment, and will succeed him, in case of vacancy,” dictates the Constitution of Brazil.
“The impediment refers to a temporary situation, such as health treatment or a trip abroad,” he explained to the news agency. AFP Daniel Capecchiprofessor of Constitutional Law at the Federal University of Rio de Janeiro.
“On the other hand, the vacancy implies a definitive cessation of the presidential exercise due to events such as death, resignation or impeachment,” he added.
But the Magna Carta, approved in 1988, does not specify the mechanisms to decide on the capacity or inability of the president to perform his duties.
A presidential source reported that “in principle” Alckmin “does not assume the agenda of the president”, whose planned activities were “postponed”.
The only exception was a meeting this Tuesday with the Prime Minister of Slovakia, Robert Ficowhom the Brazilian vice president received after he arrived in Brazil.
The Brazilian Constitution provides that, after the vice president, the line of succession follows the president of the Chamber of Deputies, the Senate and the Supreme Court.
The 72-year-old Brazilian vice president spent most of his political career in the centrist PSDB party, an old rival of Lula’s Workers’ Party (PT), who defeated him in the 2006 presidential election and years later adopted him. as his running mate.
(With information from EFE, Bloomberg and AFP)
