Bolsonaro launches new ministerial reform to win support in Congress

RIO DE JANEIRO, BRAZIL – Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro today took the first step in a new ministerial reform to cement his support in Congress and advance his agenda.

Bolsonaro began the reshuffle with a change in the government’s most strategic department: the Ministry of the Presidential Office, which is responsible for the liaison between the executive and legislative branches.

The new minister will be Senator Ciro Nogueira, a veteran politician who knows the levers of power in Brasilia, having spent many years in the upper and lower houses of Brazil’s Congress.

Nogueira is president of the right-wing Progressista Party (PP) and one of the most influential leaders of the so-called “Centrão,” an electoral bloc that unites several conservative parties that control parliament and which Bolsonaro is trying to move closer to after his opponents are closing ranks to bring him down.

“I have just accepted President Jair Bolsonaro’s honorable invitation to assume the position of Chief of Staff (Ministry of the President’s Office),” Nogueira announced on his social networks after meeting with the president.

He also asked for “God’s protection” to fulfill his new “challenge” with “commitment and dedication in search of the balance and progress that Brazil needs.”

Like many other Brazilian members of Congress, Nogueira has had problems with the justice system. He has already been denounced twice by prosecutors and is the subject of three other investigations related to corruption.

He will replace Luiz Eduardo Ramos, a general in the Army Reserve who announced, also via Twitter, that he will now become minister of the Presidency’s General Secretariat.

The current head of the latter office is Congressman Onyx Lorenzoni, who will move to the newly created Ministry of Labor and Social Security, which Bolsonaro wants to use to give more space to his allied parliamentary base.

Bolsonaro’s moves come after another ministerial reform that took place just four months ago. In late March, the head of state reshuffled six ministerial posts, including foreign, justice, and defense ministers.

With the arrival of Nogueira at the second-highest position of the executive branch, Bolsonaro is now better positioned for new alliances in Congress to guarantee his continuity in power and push through his legislative projects, including introducing paper ballots in the next elections.

“My approach with centrist parties is for governability. I’m committed to doing that,” Bolsonaro said last week in an interview with a local radio station, commenting on the future changes that began to take shape today.