President Bolsonaro Will Respect Brazil's Election Results If 'Clean And Transparent'

President Brazil Jair Bolsonaro. (Wikimedia Commons/Beto Oliveira _ Chamber of Deputies)

JAKARTA - Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro said on Monday he would respect the presidential election in October regardless of the outcome, as long as the vote was "clean and transparent."

In an interview with TV Globo's Jornal Nacional, the far-right politician insisted without evidence there had been fraud in Brazil's previous elections.

Bolsonaro made no mention of the electronic voting systems he has attacked relentlessly for months, accusing them of being open to manipulation.

But the former army captain said the military should have a role in determining the transparency of the vote.

Polls show Bolsonaro lags behind his left-wing rival, former President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, who ruled from 2003-2010 when Brazil's economy was booming.

Bolsonaro said he had accepted a country in a dire economic situation exacerbated by the COVID-19 pandemic and then the Ukraine war, and had made it through.

Among his achievements, he cited an increase in monthly welfare payments for low-income families, which he said would benefit Brazil's 20 million people, a leaflet that polls say has increased the number in recent weeks and narrowed Lula's profits.

In addition, Bolsonaro dismissed reports of deforestation in the Amazon soaring, because he had dismantled law enforcement policies.

Instead, he alleged that the government's environmental protection agency Ibama had committed abuses, by destroying heavy equipment normally confiscated in the rainforest from illegal gold miners.

Bolsonaro added that Brazil's Amazon is the size of Western Europe and the country retains 66 percent of its green area.

"Brazil does not deserve to be attacked like this. We will try to improve (Brazil's image abroad)," he said.

It is known that concerns over its failure to stop deforestation have led to resistance in the European Union, to ratify a free trade deal with the South American bloc Mercosur.

Bolsonaro said supply problems caused by the Ukraine war had now made the European Union want to speed up the completion of the trade pact.