The 79-year-old made his first notable appearance since undergoing emergency head surgery last month, donning a fedora for the ceremony held on the anniversary of the mob attack by backers of right-wing former president Jair Bolsonaro.
“If these works of art are back here, restored with care by men and women who dedicated more than 1,760 hours of their lives to them, it is because democracy won. Otherwise, they would be destroyed forever,” said Lula.
“Today is the day to say loud and clear, we are still here,” he said, in a nod to Brazilian Oscar hopeful “I’m Still Here”, a true story about the country’s military dictatorship which on Sunday earned lead actress Fernanda Torres a Golden Globe.
“We are here to say loud and clear, dictatorship never again, democracy always,” said Lula.
The 2023 attack on the presidential palace, Congress and Supreme Court came a week after Lula was inaugurated, with Bolsonaro supporters calling for the military to oust him and claiming the election was stolen.
The Brasilia riots stunned the world with striking echoes of the US Capitol insurrection two years earlier by supporters of Donald Trump.
A total of 21 damaged artworks, sculptures and historical items have been restored and returned to the seats of power in Brazil. Some 50 experts were involved in their repair.
Among the most iconic items restored is the modernist painting “As Mulatas,” a three-and-a-half-meter-wide work by Emiliano Di Cavalcanti, which had been slashed with knives.
