In a relaxed chat at ‘Conversa com Bial’, early this Wednesday (8), Geraldo Alckmin was asked if he did television, after having embittered the 4th place in the 2018 election, for “budgetary issues”.
“No, because I was a volunteer,” replied the vice president. “You didn’t get paid?”, Pedro Bial was astonished. “But Ronnie didn’t pay you a penny or anything?”
An anesthetist since 1979, Alckmin presented a fortnightly panel of health tips on the extinct ‘Todo Seu’, a nightly program on TV Gazeta de São Paulo led by Ronnie Von, now on RedeTV.
The politician reported another job without a fee in front of the cameras. “Not in the Band, either. After (from Ronnie) I went to Band with Silvia Poppovic, Lacombe. Anything!” He referred to ‘Aqui na Band’, taken off the air in 2020.
Without a mandate, the former governor of SP returned to medicine. “As I gave up all pensions (from elective positions), I only have INPS, R$ 6 thousand. So I went back to teaching.”
Since he didn’t want to work as an anesthetist again, “because it’s too stressful”, Alckmin said he had taken an acupuncture course at USP and started seeing patients.
Today, at the age of 70, he accumulates the vice-presidency with the position of minister of Industry and Commerce, and collaborates with the political articulation of the government.
It has appeared daily on TV. No longer in the role of health and grace columnist, but as one of the most powerful men in the country. His salary is R$ 39,293.32, the same as President Lula.
In another part of the conversation on Globo, Bial asked if the death of his son Thomaz in a helicopter accident, aged 31, in 2015, had shaken the faith of the practicing Catholic Alckmin.
“I would say it strengthened,” said the vice president. “There isn’t a day that I don’t think about Thomaz. Lu, same thing. It makes no sense, Bial, for people to believe that we came into the world to live, some have children, then they grow old, get sick, die and that’s it, ”he said.
“There is no logic. Evidently there is a greater plan. So I am a person of faith.”
