The largest rainforest in the world is on fire. It is on fire right now as you read these lines. It burns like it has never burned since Jair Bolsonaro came to power. I have been covering the Amazon as a journalist for twenty-five years, living in the Amazon rainforest for five years.

Never, since the return of democracy to Brazil [en 1985]I have never seen an attack so systematic or on such a scale, used for political purposes. In 2019, the first year of this far-right president’s mandate, the entire world was agitated by fires in the Brazilian Amazon.

Campaign ruined?

But today, on the eve of the first round of the presidential elections, on October 2, the incessant fires beat all records recorded under Bolsonaro himself. His re-election is doubtful, as he comes in second in all voting intent polls. The multiplication of fires may be a sign of fear that they will not resume, and therefore impunity