Itamar Franco - After The Presidency

After The Presidency

Fernando Henrique Cardoso became the official (sometimes described as Franco's hand-picked) candidate to succeed Franco and was elected President in late 1994. Franco, however, soon became a severe critic of Cardoso's government and disagreed with the privatization program. Thereafter, he served as the Ambassador to Portugal in Lisbon and then as Ambassador to the Organization of American States in Washington, DC, until 1998.

Franco considered a presidential run in 1998, but ultimately backed off after constitution changes allowed Cardoso to run again. However, he was elected governor of Minas Gerais in 1998 against the Cardoso-supported incumbent in a landslide, and as soon as he took office, he enacted a moratorium on state debt payments, worsening the national economic crisis. Itamar Franco served in the governor's seat until 2003 (declining to seek reelection and supporting the eventual winning candidate Aécio Neves) and was then has been the ambassador in Italy, until leaving the position in 2005. During the 2002 presidential election, Franco endorsed Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, who got elected, even if he, again, declined to run himself.

Having unsuccessfully sought, at age 76, the PMDB presidential nomination in 2006, he backed Geraldo Alckmin against Lula, despite having been considered again, despite his advanced age, as a candidate for President in 2010.

Franco ran instead for to be a Senator from Minas, and won the race along with Neves.