Social media posts have circulated in multiple languages to falsely claim Brazil's defence ministry declared the recent presidential election was fraudulent, ordered the arrests of court officials and suspended congress. The claims surfaced after Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva defeated the incumbent Jair Bolsonaro and won the presidential runoff election on October 30. However, these government agencies dismissed the claims and told AFP they operated as normal. Experts also said a legal clause mentioned in the false posts did not authorise one branch of the government to interfere with another branch using the military.

"The Brazilian Ministry of Defense has declared the 2022 election fraudulent," reads a Facebook post shared on November 7.

The post adds that "military arrest warrants are now being issued" to various courts -- the "Supreme Federal Court", the Supreme Electoral Court and the National Congress -- and that Brazil's government has been "suspended" pending investigation.

Veteran leftist Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva narrowly defeated far-right President Jair Bolsonaro in October's election, marking a return to office for the 77-year-old who previously served two terms between 2003 and 2010.

Bolsonaro's party called on the electoral court to reject ballots from some 280,000 voting machines, alleging errors that it said robbed their leader of re-election. But the country's top electoral authority threw out the challenge and fined the Liberal Party more than $4 million...

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