Publisher: Bolsa Família in the hands of Centrão?

When he took office, the PT had decided, for obvious reasons, that some areas of management would not be negotiated with the coalition that helped Lula reach the Planalto for the third time. It was necessary to print a "brand" of the Government among the population, preferably paving the way for the next electoral clashes. The Ministry of Social Development would be one of those non-negotiable spaces, for implementing one of the flagships of the PT administration, the Bolsa Família Program.

The program is so identified with the PT that, on the eve of the last presidential elections, the Bolsonaro government made large investments in the program, renamed Auxílio Brasil, in a desperate attempt to secure its re-election. In the popular imagination, however, the program continued to be associated with Lula. As the popular imagination is complicated, it was not easy to change this perception. When the current Minister of Planning, Simone Tebet, articulated her participation in the Government, in principle, such ministry would be her preference. He ended up being handed over to someone who was strictly trusted by the hard core of the party's ideological sectors, the former governor of Piauí, Wellington Dias.

Therefore, what was our surprise to learn that such a ministry would be on the agenda of the negotiations between the PT and the Centrão, here represented by the Progressives party. The target would be the Ministry of Health, but in the face of strong resistance - including a high cost to be paid with the population, which vehemently expressed itself against it, through social networks - the Ministry of Social Development would thus be a consolation prize to unravel the difficult political negotiations between the PT and this political grouping. Unfortunate.