Geraldo says PSB should postpone internal election.
The mayor of Recife, Geraldo Julio (PSB), said he is not interested in running for the presidency of the party, whose process is scheduled to take place next Monday (29); according to him, at the moment, the most important thing is "when" the election will be held; "There are no names under discussion. What is being discussed now is when the election will take place. Names are not under discussion," he said; since the party president, Roberto Amaral, scheduled a meeting of the National Executive to discuss the matter next week, PSB members have been trying unsuccessfully to postpone the meeting.
Pernambuco 247 - The mayor of Recife, Geraldo Julio (PSB), said that he is not interested in running for the presidency of the party, whose process is scheduled to take place next Monday (29). According to him, at the moment, the most important thing is "when" the election will be held. Since the president of the PSB, Roberto Amaral, announced the convening of the national Executive to discuss the matter next week, members of the party, especially the Pernambuco wing, have shown irritation with what they consider to be a kind of maneuver to re-elect Amaral to the detriment of Pernambuco participation.
"There are no names under discussion. What is being discussed now is when the election will take place. Names are not under discussion," Geraldo said in an interview with Rádio Jornal this Friday (26). Regarding the fact that he is one of those considered to run for the position, the mayor only said that "there is no one in Pernambuco who is positioning themselves to replace Eduardo Campos."
This Thursday (25), the state president of the PSB and Secretary of Government of the Recife City Hall, Sileno Guedes, traveled to São Paulo to meet with Amaral and ask for the postponement of the internal election. Other state directorates also reportedly expressed opposition to holding the Executive meeting because the meeting would take place in the last week of the election campaign, which would prevent many delegates from participating in a meeting that could completely alter the internal power structure of the party.
The case of Pernambuco is one of the most delicate. In recent years, Pernambuco had almost unparalleled power within the PSB, initially controlled by former governor Miguel Arraes and then by his grandson, also a former governor, Eduardo Campos. With Campos' death in a plane crash in Santos, on the coast of São Paulo, this prominence lost its strength.
It is worth noting that, of the total number of members of the Socialist Executive Committee, the São Paulo branch has the greatest representation, with 32% of the seats, and an election with the absence of a large portion of the delegates – who are campaigning – could leave the Pernambuco branch of the PSB in a supporting role in the party's decisions.