In his first act as president-elect of Brazil, Lula da Silva met Argentina’s Alberto Fernandez.

Brazil’s president-elect, Luiz Inacio “Lula” da Silva, met with Argentine President Alberto Fernandez in Sao Paulo, his first action since winning by less than two points.

They first met alone at the Intercontinental Hotel. “President, nice to see you.”, Fernández told Lula, with the Argentinian ambassador in Brasilia, Daniel Cioli, who was closest to him, and they embraced warmly. “How was it?”, he then asked, to which Lula replied “I did well”. They have not seen each other since the Brazilian joined Uruguayan Pepe Mujica at the Democracy Day celebrations in Plaza de Mayo on December 10 last year.

The meeting started from that day 13.28, after both teams are placed in adjacent rooms. Some of the issues to be addressed are the resumption of bilateral relations, the expansion of regional integration within the Mercosur framework, and the possibility of creating a South American regional currency that avoids the use of the dollar in international trade. A single currency is an idea that originated in the previous regime and has been revived.

Alberto Fernandez decided to pay a quick visit to his old friend after speaking on the phone Sunday night with the Labor Party (PT) keynote speaker, who begins his third term in Brazil, Argentina’s biggest trading partner, on Jan. 1. .

“I don’t want to be without today, it’s a fair day,” the Argentine president told reporters in a brief statement. “It’s a meeting. We’re talking more about the future than the past. Integration is needed, democracy needs to be integrated and electoral processes need to be respected”, he later assured.

And Lula confirmed He will travel to Argentina before assuming his post on January 1. It gave me great pleasure to have a first visit to Argentina before taking office. “Argentina is his home,” the president said, repeating twice that “the people of Brazil must be congratulated”. It is valuable, I wish the best for a brotherly nation, I want it to grow and it goes well. My great congratulations especially to President Lula”.

Argentine President Lula is the first person to be elected president, while current President Jair Bolsonaro remains silent and has yet to publicly acknowledge the victory of his opponent in the election. Lula won 50.9 votes to 49.1 for the right-wing leader.

One of the issues to be resolved is who will head the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB) after the ouster of Mauricio Claver-Caron from the regional lending institution. There is a deadline of November 11 to appoint a new president and an election is scheduled for the 20th. Brazil has already nominated Ilan Goldfajn, who headed the country’s central bank between 2016 and 2019 and is currently director of the Western Hemisphere Department of the International Monetary Fund (IMF).

There were already three candidates for the post: Laura Cichilla, the former president of Costa Rica; Alicia Barcena, the Mexican former secretary of ECLAC promoted by President Andrés Manuel López Obrador, and Ecuador’s Augusto de la Torre, director of her country’s central bank and head of the World Bank for Latin America.

The President visited São Paulo with the Minister of Foreign Affairs, International Trade and Worship, Santiago Cafiero; General Secretary of the Presidency Julio Vitopello; Legal and Technical Secretary, Wilma Ibarra; Presidential Spokesperson Gabriela Cerutti; and National Representatives Eduardo Valdez and Carlos Heller. The official flight will take off from the Aeropark Military Zone and arrive in San Pablo in the afternoon.

They were joined by the Argentine ambassador in Brasilia, Daniel Cioli.

Other government officials of the Frente de Todos were already in Brazil, the Minister of the Interior, Eduardo “Wado” de Pedro, the president of the Banco Nación: Silvina Batakis; Former Minister of Women, Gender and Diversity, Elizabeth Gomes Alcorta; President of the UN, Victoria Tonda, National Senator Oscar Bareilly; The former education minister, Nicolas Trotta, and Claudio Lozano, of the Unidad Popular party, are among the members of the ruling coalition.

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