His public image having recently undergone a dramatic decline, Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva is more unpopular now than at any other point in his tenure as president. According to a Datafolha Institute study published on Friday, February 14, only 24% of Brazilians currently hold a positive view of his presidency, 11 points lower than in mid-December 2024. 41% now view his performance as "bad" or "deplorable."

The left-wing leader has never before faced such disapproval, even in the worst hours of his first two terms (2003-2011), at the height of the "mensalao" corruption scandal in 2005, during which his approval rating plummeted to 28%. He is now on a par with ex-president Jair Bolsonaro (2019-2023), who was responsible for the disastrous management of the Covid-19 pandemic and who, by the end of 2021, was favored by only 22% of the population.

Long gone are the days of a triumphant Lula − "the most popular politician on Earth," in the words of Barack Obama − who left power in 2011 with an extraordinary 87% approval rating. The culmination of a record of strong economic growth, a spectacular decline in poverty and deforestation in the Amazon and Rio's selection to host the 2016 Olympic Games.

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