Mayor is a Brazilian political office that represents the head of the municipal executive branch. The etymology of the word mayor comes from the Latin praefectus and it means “rank above the others”. In Rome, the praefectus they were leaders of the various branches of public administration, and the most important was the praefectus urbi, the mayor of the city.
The Federative Republic of Brazil sets the precedent for a certain administrative independence, which leaves the public administration of cities in the hands of the mayor, as executive manager of the municipality, and in the hands of the city council, as manager of the municipal Legislative Power.
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What does it take to be mayor?
The Federal Constitution establishes the first rules for admission to the politics, and the electoral courts complement the stipulated rules. The mayor of a municipality must be elected by democratic vote and, for the election to take place, some candidacy rules must be respected. With the set of rules put in place for candidacies at all political levels, we can list the main rules.
Have Brazilian nationality: this rule extends to candidacy in all political positions in Brazil.
Be at least 21 years old.
have affiliation to any political party: no, it is not possible to launch a stand-alone candidacy, however, any politician, after being elected, can leave his party and remain without a party until the end of his term.
To be electorally domiciled in the municipality where you are standing: that is, to have the electoral title registered in that municipality.
Have full exercise of your political rights.
Be literate.
Applications must be launched within the deadlines and must comply with the established rules. The voting system for candidates for executive positions provides for the election of who receives the absolute majority of votes.
If there are only two candidates, the one who received the most valid votes will win.
If there are three or more candidates and one of them gets 50% plus one valid vote, he will win.
If there are three or more candidates and none of them gets more than 50% of the valid votes, the two most voted will go to a second contest, called the second round.
At the second round, The candidate who receives the most valid votes wins. There is still a peculiar case that happens with some constancy in the elections municipal councils in small municipalities: if there is only one candidate running for election, one valid vote is enough for him to be elected.
The candidate who meets all the rules of the eligibility profile and gets a enough votes for her election, she will be the next mayor of the municipality in question. The inauguration of the new head of the municipal Executive takes place on January 1 of the year following the election.
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mayor's role
The mayors are the head of the executive branch at municipal level. Our country has a political organization called the federative republic, which has a model of division of powers into three parts, with equal proportion:
Executive power;
Legislative power;
Judicial power.
The Executive Branch is the one that manages the actions and applies the budget and most of the laws proposed by the Legislative.
At the municipal level, we have in Brazil the chamber of councilors, responsible for Power Legislative branch, which shares municipal power with the mayor, head of the Executive. The judiciary operates within the municipalities through the judicial districts, which are the territories under the jurisdiction of the lower court judge.
![The mayor is elected through popular vote in municipal elections that take place every four years. [1]](/f/5a8935064eec08c1de01edc6d5478ae7.jpg)
That said, we can say that the The mayor's role is evident in the direct administration of the city., applying the amount authorized by the council of councilors in works, on the municipal payroll and in the maintenance of the various services public services offered by the municipality, such as education, health, property security of municipal guards, social assistance, health inspection, etc. The mayor is the largest municipal manager from all the agencies behind these services.
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Deputy Mayor's Role
the deputy mayor competes in elections forming a ticket with the mayor. It is not necessary for the deputy to be from the same party as the mayoral candidate, but there must be an alignment or a coalition between the parties.. The function of the deputy mayor is to act in the city hall in cases of absence of the mayor. The mayor needs to sign orders, enact laws of the council of councilors and comply with a series of bureaucratic matters that cannot stop in his absence. Therefore, if the mayor is absent from the city, it is the deputy mayor who takes his place momentarily.
the deputy mayor too can take the mayor's place definitively if there is:
impeachment;
renounce;
incapacitation due to illness;
death of the mayor.
Image credit
[1] Leonidas Santana / Shutterstock
By Francisco Porphyry
Philosophy teacher
Would you like to reference this text in a school or academic work? Look:
PORPHYRIO, Francisco. "Mayor"; Brazil School. Available in: https://brasilescola.uol.com.br/politica/prefeito.htm. Accessed on June 27, 2021.