Will Brazil stay on the Left?

27. 7. 2010 / Fabiano Golgo

Dolejší mentioned some recent opinion polls, which show Dilma and Serra in a tie. Serra only had better poll results in the first months of this year, before Mrs Roussef became better known. Since then, if we ignore the polls that show a tie are paid for by hard-core neoliberal newspapers, the so-called independent media shows Dilma 8 points ahead. And hardly there is a chance of her losing.

Mr Serra is admired for the fact that he used to be the president of the University Students Union (UNE) in 1968, when the military dictatorship made it illegal and he, as a consequence, was tortured and exiled to Chile (his wife, who worked for socialist deposed president Salvador Allende, and two kids are Chilean). His party, the Partido da Social Democracia Brasileira (PSDB), is divided in their support, not all members accept that the candidate is not Aécio Neves, the grandson of our first post-dictatorship president, Tancredo Neves, who suspiciously died went into a coma the day before he had to take power in 1985 (so the military-backed vice-president became the president).

Serra is also believed to have misused the Federal Police many times to gather information or try to arrest his opponents.

I've known Dilma Roussef personally since adolescence, when she was a constant guest at my TV show (for those who don't know, I worked in a nightly political debate called Guerrilheiros da Notícia, on TV2 Guaíba, in Porto Alegre). She was also a dissident and was raped and tortured for a whole month during the 1970s. She has been a politician from my part of Brazil (which has 12 million inhabitants) for a long time, but she was not well known in the rest of the country (which has over 190 million). The masses don't follow politics, so not everybody knew who was Lula's Minister of Energy - Dilma Roussef.

Lula chose her to succeed him, against the wishes of his Worker's Party (Partido dos Trabalhadores). With lots of names that have been a symbol of the party since Lula had the guts to confront the military dictatorship with the promotion of huge strikes that almost broke Brazil apart from 1979 to 1982, his own party first opposed her name, but the president, which counts with the higher popularity poll results in the planet, oscilating between 82 and 89 percent of approval, ignored it and has been trying to make Dilma well known by the masses. And he has succeeded.

He takes her to all presidential events (where there are cameras) and because of that has been fined by the High Electoral Tribunal many times for breaking the electoral laws (where a president cannot use State resources for a presidential campaign), but the truth is that Brazilians love Lula and he has a free pass to mostly everything. Proof of that was when, about 4 years ago, it became more than evident that all of Lula's closest co-workers, from his Chief of Staff José Dirceu to his wife's secretary were all receiving illegal monthly amounts of money, often to secure votes in favor of the government. After months of crisis, all heads rolled, but not Lula's. The country basically believed he didn't know what his people were doing.

Lula also decided to forgive his enemies and made a coalition with two former presidents and politicians who supported and helped the military dictatorship. He has ignored the corruption scandals of his allies.

But Lula is like Putin. Not only in his popularity and in the way the population prefers to turn a blind eye to his excesses because, in comparison with the previous ones, both seem to have been the best presidents each country has ever had. But also in the fact that he would win a third term easily, if the legislation would allow more two consecutive terms. Because it does not, Lula decided to choose a close ally who will continue to listen to him and will give way for his return in 2015. He makes no secret that he would run again in 2014. And Dilma, who had cancer and was treated with chemotherapy last year, agrees with having one term.

Lula's backing is very powerful for the common folk. Mr Serra doesn't have any appeal to the lower classes, because he dresses and looks just like a business manager. He talks using more difficult language, while Dilma sounds like a primary school teacher, speaking correctly, but in a simple way. And we cannot ignore that many people are excited at the possibility of having our first female president. Most people don't vote because of their political opinions (which most don't have any), but out of sympathy.

The only obstacle for Dilma winning on the first round is the third candidate, also a woman, Marina Silva. She was Lula's Environment Minister, but left the government exactly because of Dilma, who as a Minister of Energy Resources wanted to let another 1/3 of the Amazon be cut off, among other controversial measures that were, in the end, approved. Part of the votes that would go for Dilma will go for Marina in the first round of voting. But in the second, she would get all Green Party voters, who would never vote for Serra.

It is also important to take into account that voting is obligatory for Brazilians. Not going to vote means we don't get a piece of paper that is required everywhere, be it to get a driver's license or register at a public school, even to open a bank account one has to prove that has voted in the previous elections. Those who can't have to pay a fine. That makes the election results more predictable through polls, for there is no danger that part of the electorate likes one candidate, but doesn't go actually cast the vote for him or her.

What gives Dilma the biggest impulse is that she is the specialist on the resource that will make Brazil the third largest economy in the world and the fifth richest country in the planet already by 2015 - the discovery of another 3 so-called pre-salt huge oil fields in our shores. Lula argues that she is the expert on oil and thus we should want her to manage it.

I, personally, will vote for Marina Silva, from the Green Party, because she never bent her beliefs to accommodate political gains. She refused to let the Amazon and the Sao Francisco River be partly destroyed by the Lula government. Her only problem, to many Brazilians, is that she is a fierce evangelical believer, which means she is against legalizing abortion and embryo research, for example. But she has never been involved in any corruption scandals or ethical controversies.

Dima Roussef's numbers in the polls have been growing steadily. In the first three months of polling, she had between 20 and 24 percent. Only half a year later she already appears with between 40 and 48 percent. While Serra's have been going down in the same proportion, up until the recent supposed tie.

If Serra wins, Brazil will join the Chile/Colombia/Peru axis of right wing governments against the Venezuelan-led leftist Bolivia/Ecuador/Uruguay bloc, which is often supported by the populist Peronist Argentinian government of the Kirchner couple. But few believe Serra, who has already lost the presidential elections to Lula in 2000, could win this time.

Political parties in Brazil have the right to broadcast their spots for almost 2 months before the elections in a forced pool of television stations and radios, which from next week will have a full hour every night, at the prime time slot of 20h30 to 21h30. At that time, no electronic medium is allowed to broadcast anything else but the political spots, each party having the number of minutes correspondent to the proportion of its representation in the Parliament. So Lula will be every single night telling the country to vote for Dilma. So I find it almost impossible that the other candidates can win against not Dilma, but Lula.

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