The statement is - false.
Brazil became a Portuguese and not a Spanish colony because the Portugal king that sponsored Columbus was the first to be aware of the discovery. So the Portuguese king called upon the Portuguese-Spanish Treaty by which everything south of the Azores belongs to Portugal. The Pope got involved in it all so that everything is fair and passes by without any conflict, so the Portuguese got everything on the eastern part, while the Spanish got everything on the western part, thus Brazil fell into the arms of Portugal and not Spain.