By Marcela Ayres and Lisandra Paraguassu
BRASILIA, Oct 5 (Reuters) – Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva is considering tapping Vice President Geraldo Alckmin to be his next finance minister if re-elected, two people familiar with the proposal said, in a bid to bolster his fiscal credibility and win over centrist voters after Senator Flavio Bolsonaro beat expectations in the first-round vote.
Under the proposal, Alckmin would remain vice president while also becoming finance minister next year, cementing his authority over economic policy, the sources said, speaking on condition of anonymity because the deliberations are private. The proposal is still under discussion.
The Brazilian presidency did not respond to a request for comment.
Alckmin, a veteran centrist, unsuccessfully challenged Lula for the presidency in 2006 and has served two terms as governor of Sao Paulo. He also ran Lula’s Development, Industry and Trade Ministry until earlier this year, making him a key interlocutor with Washington since the US imposed sweeping tariffs on Brazilian goods.
Alckmin is widely considered a moderating force in Lula’s government, with strong ties to the business community, although critics say his influence has been overshadowed in Lula’s current term by policies widely seen as tilting to the left.
Lula also considered making Alckmin his finance minister in 2022 but ultimately chose Workers’ Party member Fernando Haddad as finance minister after winning in both the first and second rounds.
Seeking a fourth non-consecutive term, Lula finished second on Sunday behind Senator Bolsonaro, the eldest son of former President Jair Bolsonaro and an ally of Trump, in a first-round result that defied most polling forecasts, which had pointed to a narrow lead for the president.
The outcome, along with the electoral success of Bolsonaro’s right-wing allies in Congress, sparked a strong market rally on Monday as investors bet a Bolsonaro administration would be more likely to deliver faster fiscal consolidation with broader legislative support.
Since Lula took office, Brazil’s gross public debt has risen by more than 10 percentage points of GDP to 82.9%, a key vulnerability for the leftist leader despite inflation running below historical averages, stronger-than-expected economic growth, record-low unemployment and gains in real wages.
In remarks after the first-round results on Sunday, Lula signaled the importance of Alckmin to his runoff strategy, declaring that “no one in this country has the moral authority to lecture me or Alckmin on fiscal policy or fiscal responsibility, given what he did in Sao Paulo state and what we did in Brazil.”
Elevating Alckmin could help attract voters concerned about fiscal credibility who are unwilling to back Bolsonaro but have grown disillusioned with what they see as an increasingly populist turn by Lula’s government, the sources said.
(Reporting by Marcela Ayres and Lisandra ParaguassuEditing by Brad Haynes and Aurora Ellis)
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