Brazil's former right-wing president Jair Bolsonaro will stand trial for allegedly attempting to stage a coup against his successor Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, the country's Supreme Court ruled unanimously on March 26.

The five-member panel determined there was sufficient evidence to proceed with a trial that could begin as early as this year.

If convicted, the 70-year-old former leader could face years in imprisonment.

President Lula, speaking from Japan where he was concluding a state visit, said on March 27 he hopes "justice is served" in the proceedings against his predecessor.

"I only hope that justice is served. If he is found innocent in the proceedings, let him be declared innocent. If he is guilty, let him be punished," Lula said, as quoted by AFP.

Bolsonaro, who flew to Brasília for the court decision, promptly rejected the charges during a press conference.

"It seems they have something personal against me," he said, describing the accusations as "grave and baseless."

The former army captain nicknamed the "Trump of the Tropics" has consistently denied attempting to block Lula's inauguration, claiming he is the victim of "political persecution" designed to prevent him from running for president again in 2026.

Justice Alexandre de Moraes, who headed the panel, recommended that Bolsonaro and seven former officials stand trial over events leading to the January 8, 2023 storming of government buildings by his supporters, just one week after Lula's inauguration. The violent protesters drew inspiration from the events of January 6, 2021 in Washington, where supporters of US President Donald Trump broke into the Capitol, rejecting his election loss in 2020.

The co-defendants include former spy chief Alexandre Ramagem, former navy commander Admiral Almir Garnier Santos, former security minister Anderson Torres, and four other high-ranking officials from Bolsonaro's administration, including three generals.

Federal investigators' 884-page report, unsealed in November 2024, alleged Bolsonaro "planned, acted and was directly and effectively aware of the actions of the criminal organisation aiming to launch a coup d'état and eliminate the democratic rule of law."

Brazil's Attorney-General Paulo Gonet went further in a February report, accusing Bolsonaro of leading the alleged plot, which reportedly included plans to poison Lula and assassinate Justice Moraes.

Bolsonaro, who governed Brazil from 2019 to 2022, never publicly acknowledged his narrow defeat to Lula in the October 2022 election.

He was in the US during the January 2023 riots, when police arrested 1,500 people.

The former president is already barred from seeking public office until 2030 for falsely claiming Brazil's voting system was vulnerable to fraud.

This week’s court decision creates an additional significant obstacle to his future political ambitions.