A MASSIVE TURNAROUND
Will Lula Make a Comeback? Global Imperialists and Resource Extractors
Shudder at the Prospect
With the potential comeback of Lula da Silva, Brazil may once again be on a
path away from fascism and one that puts economic justice and
anti-imperialism first.
by Alan Macleod
March 26th, 2021
By Alan Macleod
BRASILIA, BRAZIL Will the worlds sixth most populous country move away
from fascism and towards a social democracy putting economic justice and
anti-imperialism first once more?
That is the question on Brazilian minds right now, as earlier this month the
Supreme Court dismissed all charges against former President Luis Inácio
Lula da Silva. A colossal figure in domestic and world politics, Lula was
falsely convicted of fraud in 2017, and spent more than 18 months in prison,
becoming, in the words of renowned academic Noam Chomsky, the worlds most
prominent political prisoner.
Yesterday, the Supreme Court also ruled that the judge who sentenced Lula,
Sergio Moro, made a biased decision. Secret documents show that Moro was
actually working with the prosecution to ensure Lula was convicted, paving
the way for fascist candidate Jair Bolsonaro to assume the presidency. In a
staggering display of quid pro quo, Moro then accepted the job of
Bolsonaros Minister of Justice.
A massive turnaround
There is a sense of elation for [Lulas] supporters and those that stood by
him for so many years, said Michael Fox, a filmmaker based in the southern
city of Florianopolis, who likened following Brazilian politics to a ride on
a rollercoaster:
In just a few weeks, Lulas charges have been annulled and now the once
super-star judge Sergio Moro is under formal investigation for judicial
bias, a felony charge. Its a massive turnaround and it cant be
understated.
This is victory for democracy. We again have hope of a better Brazil with
Lula free, one jubilant supporter of the former president told Fox.
Brazil Lula
A support of Lula demonstrates outside the Supreme Court in Brasilia,
Brazil, March 9, 2021. Eraldo Peres | AP
Lula was the runaway favorite to be re-elected in 2018; just six weeks
before the election, polls showed that more than twice as many people
intended to vote for him as for Bolsonaro. But the courts ruled that he was
barred from running, even from the prison cell Moro put him in, a decision
that virtually ensured a Bolsonaro victory. A recent poll found that more
than half of Brazil said they would definitely or possibly vote for him in
next years presidential election, despite the fact he has not yet even made
a decision about standing.
The chances of Lulas re-election are huge, Brazilian journalist Nathália
Urban told MintPress. He is still tremendously popular, and is being
especially favored in the face of this polarized scenario, which places him
as the only one capable of beating Bolsonaro.
Bolsonaro is scared. His approval rating is dropping, Fox noted. If Lula
decides to run, and he is not somehow again blocked from running, like in
2018, he has every chance of winning in 2022. Fox added that, after a year
of Bolsonaros downplaying or outright denying the virus that has killed
over 300,000 Brazilians, Lulas freedom has spurred the current president to
act more responsibly. Things got so bad at one point last year, armed,
criminal gangs chastised Bolsonaros recklessness, unilaterally imposing a
lockdown in areas under their control. We want the best for the population.
If the government wont do the right thing, organized crime will, read an
official communique from a group of drug dealers in Rio de Janeiro.
"At the Mercy of a Deranged Lunatic How Jair Bolsonaro Is Endangering
Brazil During COVID19
Brazil's response to COVID-19 been so lackluster, that in some areas
organized gangs are imposing their own curfews and lockdowns.
MintPress News | Alan Macleod | Mar 25, 2020
A towering figure
Despite being coy about next year, Lula is behaving as if he is already
president, releasing statements urging his countryfolk to wear masks and
inviting U.S. President Joe Biden to an emergency coronavirus summit on
vaccine equity.
A towering figure in his homeland, the former street urchin and shoe-shine
boy turned union leader was elected president in 2002 and served until 2011,
leaving office with an 83% approval rating. The economy grew steadily and
poverty was halved under his stewardship. While the U.S. was invading
Afghanistan and Iraq, Lula declared his own domestic war against hunger.
His signature policy was the Bolsa Família package; a deal whereby mothers
were given cash transfers of up to $150 per month if they enrolled their
children in school and ensured they were immunized against yellow fever and
other deadly diseases. An estimated 50 million people benefited from it. It
was policies like these, Urban noted, that built his support among the
countrys popular classes.
Lulas impact on Brazil and on Latin America cannot be overstated. He
dominated politics in both from being first elected as president in 2002,
and he continues to dominate Brazilian politics, said Dr. Barry Cannon, a
sociologist from the National University of Ireland, Maynooth, who also
noted that, under Lulas rule, Brazil was remarkably stable socially and
economically.
Lula
Lula is carried by supporters a day after he was released from prison in Sao
Bernardo do Campo, Brazil. Nelson Antoine | AP
Needing the support of liberals and more centrist forces, Lula was not as
radical as many social movements that helped him into power would have
liked, and did not challenge U.S. power as directly as other governments
like those in Venezuela or Bolivia. But as Steve Ellner, a retired
political scientist from the Universidad de Oriente in Venezuela, explained
to MintPress activists saw his government as a friendly administration;
one that would listen to them and certainly not repress them in the ways
previous governments had done.
Perhaps his most important impact, however, was on international affairs.
Lula was one of the leaders of the so-called Pink Tide a wave of Latin
American countries that began electing leftist, pro-poor, anti-imperialist
governments in the 2000s. By 2011, a large majority of the region was ruled
by these forces. Leaders like Venezuelas Hugo Chavez, Bolivias Evo Morales
and Ecuadors Rafael Correa rankled officials in Washington by nationalizing
key resources and denouncing capitalism and inequality. Lula was not as
radical, but, as leader of the worlds fifth-largest country by area and
population, he was arguably the most important.
Resisting efforts to divide the Pink Tide
Using the divide and rule tactic, U.S. officials tried to separate good
leftist leaders (like Lula), who refrained from expropriating resources from
Western corporations and pursued more reformist measures from the bad left
of Chavez, Morales, Correa and Cubas Fidel Castro. But Lula would have none
of it, openly campaigning for Chavezs re-election in 2012. Chavez, count
on me, count on the Brazilian Workers Party, count on the solidarity and
support of each
democrat and each Latin American. Your victory will be
ours
and thanks, comrade, for everything you have done for Latin America,
he said in an endorsement speech. Thus, many Pink Tide leaders saw
themselves as part of the same struggle against the American-dominated
economic and political system, with differences in their policies less about
ideology and more about domestic realities.
While not denouncing imperialism openly like the bad left, Lula was still
a huge check on American ambitions in Latin America, blocking attempts to
isolate other states and rejecting a U.S.-supported secessionist movement in
Bolivia. Brazil was also a key participant in a number of new regional
organizations aimed at replacing discredited, U.S.-dominated ones.
Lula also traveled to Iran independently and convinced president Mahmoud
Ahmadinejad to sign a nuclear deal based on commitments the Obama
administration had written up. He naively expected President Barack Obama,
who had previously endorsed him as the most popular politician on Earth,
to be delighted. But, instead, Obama tried to stop Ahmadinejad from signing
the deal the U.S. had agreed to, shattering the pretense that Washington
cared about securing peace in the region. In response to the deal, Obama
increased sanctions on Iran and treated Lula, in the Brazilians words, as a
persona non grata on the international political stage.
Former Brazilian President Lula da Silva: Obama, Hillary Ordered Me Not to
Negotiate with Iran
In a wide-ranging interview, former president of Brazil Lula da Silva
described how the U.S. ordered him not to negotiate with Iran.
MintPress News | Alan Macleod | Jan 24, 2020
In Cannons view:
Globally [Lula] symbolized hope for the left here was a phenomenally
successful leftist politician that everyone seemed to like. It is hard to
conceive of the Pink Tide of leftist politics, which dominated Latin America
from the turn of the millennium until the coup against Dilma Rousseff,
Lulas successor, in 2016, without Lula. He was its undisputed leader.
After having secretly wiretapped the Brazilian government for years, the
United States government was deeply involved in the phony anti-corruption
drive that saw Dilma impeached and Lula jailed. The U.S. Department of
Justice secretly attempted to pay the anti-corruption taskforce $682
million in kickbacks for its work. Recorded conversations show that Lulas
lead prosecutor described his arrest as a gift from the CIA, while FBI
agents boasted about their work toppling governments in Brazil. President
Joe Bidens advisors told The New York Times that his administration would
seek to revive the anti-corruption campaign pioneered in Brazil and
extend it across the region.
Times Editorial Lets Slip Joe Bidens Latin America Policy: More Obama-Style
Coups
Buried deep in a New York Times editorial is an eye-opening sentence
revealing the disturbing reality of the Joe Biden Latin America policy
MintPress News | Alan Macleod | Oct 28, 2020
impact, political and economic
If Lula and the Workers Party do come back to power, it seems likely that
they will stymie many U.S. foreign policy goals, including isolating
Venezuela, China and Russia. Yet Bolsonaro has proven so incompetent a
leader and manager that both Ellner and Cannon believe that many in
Washington will at least attempt to work with Lula, trying to move him to a
more moderate position. However, the currently deeply divided political
climate in Brazil does not bode well for centrists, as Ellner explained:
Most likely, the 2022 elections will be polarizing, which means that more
moderate candidates will be shunted aside. In that case, it is unlikely
that the Washington establishment will distance itself much from Bolsonaro
or manifest any sympathy for the Workers Party candidate.
Danny DanonLuiz Inacio Lula da Silva, Hugo Chavez, Rafael Correa, Evo
Morales
Lula, second from right, poses with (left to right) Hugo Chavez, Evo Morales
and Rafael Correa at a 2008 summit in Brazil. Eraldo Peres | AP
Certainly, the investor class is not happy at the prospect of a return to
the rule of the Workers Party: on the news of the annulment of Lulas
charges, the Brazilian stock exchange plunged by 4%; Reuters told its
business readers that his release would have dire consequences. Presumably
not for Brazilians, but for asset prices, as Bolsonaros market-friendly
economic reform agenda (a euphemism for the firesale of state assets, huge
cuts to public sector wages and pensions, and tax breaks for the wealthy)
would come to an end.
However, the news that Lula is finally free has many across the region
hoping for a better future. While Lula led the rebel alliance in the 2000s,
the empire struck back in the 2010s, with many conservative or reactionary
governments coming to power, often with the help of U.S-backed coups, dark
money or lawfare tactics, as seen in Brazil. However, with the election of
Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador in Mexico and Alberto Fernandez in Argentina,
the defeat of the Bolivian coup, and the likely imminent return of
progressive forces in Ecuador, there is a new hope across Latin America and
beyond.
If Brazil turns left again, especially with Lula in power, it will
galvanize the left in the region once again, Cannon stated, noting that a
friendly Brazil would give its neighbors breathing space to grow
independently while warning that the country desperately needs to find new
political leaders younger than the 75-year-old former steelworker and that
the region has to look beyond extractivism as the basis of the economy.
[Lulas] election will be a godsend for the multipolar world Ellner added.
