‘I am a LIBERATOR!’ Bolsonaro declares he has FREED Brazil from ‘political correctness’

The far-right leader vowed to respect democracy and to carry out difficult economic reforms adding “we have a great nation to rebuild” and he will “restore order” in Brazil. Mr Bolsonaro, dubbed Tropical Trump, was elected as the country’s first far-right president in October since a military dictatorship gave way to civilian rule three decades years ago. The 63-year-old has called on ministers to help him “free the nation definitively from the yoke of corruption, crime, economic irresponsibility and ideological submission.”

One-third of his cabinet are former army officers, mostly fellow cadets at the Black Needles academy, all outspoken backers of the country’s 1964-1985 military regime.

US President Donald Trump congratulated the leader on Twitter saying “The USA is with you”.

Similar to Mr Trump’s policies, Mr Bolsonaro wants to pull Brazil out of the Paris climate agreement and to move the Brazilian embassy in Israel from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem.

During his campaign, Mr Bolsonaro was stabbed and hospitalised for weeks. 

More than 10,000 soldiers and police officers were on the streets of the capital city of Brasilia as Mr Bolsonaro and his wife rode in an open-topped Rolls Royce to Congress.

Many supporters were wearing the Brazilian flag on their shoulders to watch the leader be draped with the presidential sash.

Mr Bolsonaro wants to remove the “cultural Marxism” introduced by recent leftist governments and bring back conservative policies.

He secured 55 percent of the vote to defeat Fernando Haddad from the left-wing Workers’ Party.

The former army captain swept to power on a pledge to fight crime and corruption in the scandal-hit country but critics fear his trenchant right-wing views overstep the mark in a modern democracy.

In June 2011, he declared he would “rather his son die in a car accident than be gay”.

He once said he “would not employ women equally” because of their maternity leave entitlement.

And in an infamous exchange in 2015 he told a congresswoman she was too ugly to rape.

After criticising Brazil’s government in a 1999 interview, Mr Bolsonaro was asked whether he would shut down Congress if he were president.

He said: “There is no doubt. I would perform a coup on the same day.

“Congress doesn’t work and I am sure that at least 90 percent of the population would celebrate and applaud because it doesn’t work.

“The Congress today is useless lets do the coup already. Let’s go straight to the dictatorship.”