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Where Daniel the Cuckold and
Zig Zag Clown Vie for Office
by
Simon Romero
Sept. 16, 2012
Geraldo Wolverine campaigning in
Piracicaba, Brazil.
RIO DE
JANEIRO — Batman is running for office in the
Brazilian city of Uberlândia.
Not one but two James Bonds are seeking city council seats, in Ponta Grossa and Birigui. Elsewhere in Brazil, voters
are being urged to cast ballots for candidates with names like Daniel
the Cuckold and Elvis
Didn’t Die.
Brazil has nurtured one of the world’s most vibrant
democracies since its military dictatorship ended in 1985. As campaigning for
municipal elections in October intensifies, this vitality is evident on the
ballots, which reflect Brazil’s
remarkably loose restrictions on what candidates can call themselves.
Ballots are filled with
superhero names (five Batmans are running this year), mangled versions of
American television characters (like the Macgaiver running in Espírito Santo
State, inspired by the “MacGyver“ secret-agent series), and an array of raunchy
nicknames.
“It’s a marketing strategy, a
political program, because if I said Geraldo Custódio, no one was going to
recognize me,” said Geraldo Custódio, 38, a teacher of driver’s education who
is running for city council with the name Geraldo Wolverine in Piracicaba,
an industrial city in São Paulo
State.
Mr. Custódio said he had
gotten the nickname of Wolverine, after the Marvel
comics character, when he tried out for the
reality television show “Big Brother Brazil.” He did not make it on the
show, but the sideburns he adopted, along with his big build, made the nickname
stick. He now campaigns with long metal talons. One of his ads says, “Vote for
the guy who has claws!”
Creatively named candidates
with talons might raise eyebrows elsewhere, but this is Brazil, a proudly
relaxed country when it comes to the names of
its politicians.
Consider the president, Dilma
Rousseff, almost universally referred to by her first name. Her immediate
predecessor incorporated his childhood nickname, Lula (“squid”), into his full
name, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva. Calling him Mr. da Silva here raises hackles.
Fernando Henrique Cardoso, the president from 1995 through 2002, is commonly
referred to as Fernando Henrique or by his initials, F.H.C., but rarely by his
last name.
Some candidates in local
elections jump on the bandwagon of a well-known politician, explaining,
perhaps, why dozens of candidates across Brazil named Luiz or Luis have
incorporated “Lula” into their own campaign names. Then there are the hat tips
to overseas personages, reflected in the 16 Obamas running in Brazil this
year. Popular culture and religion also inspire: Ladi Gaga (sic) is running in
Santo André, in the São Paulo area, while Christ of Jerusalem (a k a Omedino Pantoja da Silva)
lost a municipal election in Porto
Velho, an Amazonian city, in 2008.
“I think Barack Obama is more
than a politician; he is an icon,” said Gerson Januário de Almeida, 44, an
administrative assistant in the public health system who is running for city
council with the name “Obama BH” in Belo Horizonte, one of Brazil’s largest
cities.
Mr. de Almeida said he had
come by his nickname when American tourists riding the cable car to Sugar Loaf Mountain in Rio
de Janeiro remarked that he bore a striking
resemblance to the American president. Since then, Mr. de Almeida said, he has
earned additional income doing freelance gigs posing as Mr. Obama’s
doppelgänger at promotional events.
There are some limits to the
names Brazilians can choose when running for office. The law stipulates that
the names chosen should correspond to the candidates’ nicknames or how they are
commonly referred to.
Judges in some cities have
had enough of some especially bizarre or vulgar-sounding election names,
issuing injunctions to keep them off ballots. And electoral courts have tried
to prevent candidates from using the names of state-controlled companies and
other bureaucratic entities.
This has not stopped some
candidates from trying. Israel Soares, a candidate in São Paulo State,
is running as National Institute of Social Security’s Defender of the People.
Such names may attract
attention in a complex political system with more than 20 parties of various
ideological stripes, but seasoned electoral strategists say they seem to offer
little more than a sideshow in many races.
“I don’t know if I would
advise my clients to do it,” said Justino Pereira, a political consultant in
São Paulo who has advised numerous candidates in municipal elections, including
one named Palhaço Zig Zag (Zig Zag Clown), who lost.
Mr. Pereira said candidates
were particularly inspired after another clown popular on television under the
stage name Tiririca, which roughly translates as “Grumpy,” won a seat in
Congress. (Relatively few people know his real name, Francisco Everardo
Oliveira Silva.) “Using nicknames is an easy way to draw attention,” Mr.
Pereira said, “but doesn’t necessarily make a lasting effect.”
Of course, some candidates in
a country with such a whimsical approach to names have no need to resort to
wild nicknames. These aspirants for office already have colorful names bestowed
by their parents, reflecting the attention paid in the past in Brazil to some
foreign political figures.
Jimmi Carter Santarém Barroso
is running in Amazonas State; John Kennedy Abreu Sousa is running in
Maranhão, in Brazil’s
northeast; and Chiang Kai Xeque Braga Barroso — whose first name evokes Chiang
Kai-shek, the Chinese rival in the mid-20th century to Mao Zedong — is seeking
to be elected in Tocantins
State.
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