Brazil’s far-right former president Jair Bolsonaro, seeking to make a political comeback even as he faces a criminal trial, was hospitalized Friday with severe abdominal pain six years after he barely survived being stabbed.
Bolsonaro, 70, started feeling “unbearable abdominal pain” at a political event in the northeastern state of Rio Grande do Norte, a senior member of his Liberal Party said.
He was brought to a local hospital where he was “stabilized,” according to rightwing senator Rogerio Marinho, then flown by helicopter to another, bigger facility in the state capital, Natal.
An AFP photographer witnessed Bolsonaro arriving at the Rio Grande Hospital in Natal by ambulance with an intravenous drip, awake and calm.
Television footage had shown him walking to the helicopter, with evident discomfort.
Bolsonaro has had recurring health problems since September 2018, when an attacker stabbed the then-candidate at a presidential campaign rally in the southeastern state of Minas Gerais.
Bolsonaro lost some 40 percent of his blood and underwent emergency surgery after the attack, perpetrated by a man later declared mentally unfit to stand trial.
He went on to win that election, serving a single term until 2022 when he lost a runoff to leftist Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva.
– ‘Trump of the Tropics’ –
The former president has undergone at least four surgeries since his stabbing, including the placement and subsequent removal of a colostomy bag, which made him prone to intestinal disorders.
He has also undergone other, unrelated procedures during his presidency, including surgery to remove a bladder stone.
Bolsonaro, who is hoping to make a comeback in the 2026 presidential elections, was set to start a political tour of Rio Grande do Norte on Friday.
He has been barred from holding public office until 2030 after he was found guilty of falsely casting doubt on the credibility of Brazil’s electoral system.
He has been hoping the ban will be overturned to give him a shot at a return to power in the style of his idol Donald Trump in the United States.
But those plans were dimmed last month when Bolsonaro was ordered to stand trial on charges of plotting a coup against Lula.
If convicted, the former army captain risks a jail term of over 40 years, and political banishment.
“We hope this is just a simple complication and that there is no need for surgical intervention,” Marinho said in a social media post Friday.
“We are confident that the president will get through this.”
Dubbed the “Trump of the Tropics,” Bolsonaro has been the target of multiple investigations since his turbulent years as leader of Latin America’s biggest economy.
Police investigating the alleged coup plot confiscated his passport last year.
