I get his (mild) attacks on Bolsonaro make him look better, but he's not done any actual fucking reforms. At all.
All he did during his first government was create some means tested welfare programs and keep public funding going, all while not combatting the bourgeoisie's interests. Which in turn, left ample time for fascism to grow, he even funded some of the exponents of it like Igreja Universal do Reino de Deus (evangelical cult that is much like US prosperity gospel). Not to mention shooting incarceration rates sky high by kicking off the war on drugs by law in 2006 and invading Haiti on behalf of the UN in 2004
His ministries are all commanded by neolibs, and even far right União Brasil in communications and tourism.
Fucking interest in loans is the actual highest in the world at 13.25%! (~9% per year accounting for inflation)
Just because a government doesn't outright support the public sanctions on Cuba, China and the DPRK it doesn't make it a fucking ally, hell, many European countries do the same and I don't see y'all praising it.
Lula is not moving Brazil any, and I mean any, closer to liberation. This job is up for the communists, nominally the Brazilian Communist Party (which is at the moment undergoing a split due to a complacent and persecutory petit-bourgeois central committee that doesn't want to oppose Lula but that's beside the point)
Every time I see Lula praise here one of my neurons explodes with anger
Edit FYI: I am actually organized in the youth of the Brazilian Communist Party. If y'all want any more info just ask (ofc nothing confidential)
I am not Brazilian but I am quite skeptical of Lula myself. He thinks he can rapidly increase agricultural production without any deforestation. He wants his cake and to eat it too if you ask me.
Also he is basically militarizing the forest. Armed federal agents are carrying out operations on Indigenous lands, ostensibly to "help" Tribes against squatter and artison miners, but with no indication of respect for sovereignty. It makes me wildly nervous. They have their justifications and that is all they need. They don't couch it in genocidal rhetoric but what is the difference at the end at of the day? I'm not sure there is a government on earth I trust to stop the tribe killings.
Especially when everyone either must worship the market or is directly threatened by it.
I tell you what though, I usually keep it to myself because there might be some international benifit to his policy but honestly there is a lot of bleak shit that signals to me it's all very status quo. I can't help but ask what kind of word this will build.