Interview with Lula THE following interview with the leader of Brazil's Workers Party (PT), Luis Inacio da Silva (Lula), first appeared in the February 1991 issue of the party's review Teoria e Debate. The interview was conducted by Joao Machado and Paulo Vanucchi. 3333S W HAT is the situation in
Brazil after a year of Fernando Collor's government?
Brazilian society has discovered that the neo-liberal policies of President Collor don't work. Contrary to promises, nothing has been solved. Inflation is continuing — although it has fallen from 84 to 20% a month at a high social cost in unemployment, in agriculture, in wages, in health and in education.
It is thus urgently necessary to put forward an alternative which can bring economic growth to Brazil, involving the redistribution of wealth and the compensation of the workers who have suffered under this plan. The Workers Party (PT) must prove that it is possible to get inflation down while creating jobs, in the framework of another development model.
All this must go together with a serious organizational effort to build a popular movement, since if our efforts are limited to the institutional level, the PT will become very vulnerable. The possibility of our bringing an alternative to fruition largely depends on our capacity to organize the social movement and to establish political alliances with progressive parties to confront the government.
Society has many defence mechanisms. We must therefore go to the factories and call on the workers to fight and show, on the streets, that another policy is possible. • Was your decision not to take part in the federal parliament to which you were elected correct?
I continue to believe that I was right. As far as I am concerned, to fight a govparliament; nobody can tell them apart. People criticize the whole body, not the particular politicians. My priority has therefore been the consolidation of the PT. Despite its electoral breakthrough, it has hardly made any organizational progress. People have to regain confidence in the basic structures of the party, and this means real political participation by the working class. I hope for a lot from the "parallel government". It can show people that there are other possibilities; and expose the real intentions and contradictions of official government policy; but the parallel government will not be viable if it does not get my full attention. • During the second round of voting in Sao Paolo in 1990, the PT called for void ballots. However it is clear that the majority of the PT's electorate, and many of its members did not follow this advice and voted for the liberal bourgeois candidate Luiz Antonio Fleury [from the PMDB — Party of the Brazilian Democratic Movement] in order to defeat Maluf [candidate for the rightist PDS - Democratic Social Party].
When I was a union leader the proposals of the leadership were not always accepted in the factories. Many, many times I came to a mass meeting to hear people saying: "No, we don't want that, we want something else." Such reactions do not undermine the leader's role. On the contrary it is strengthened, because he said what he really thought; he had the humility to present a proposal without fear of losing.
The same thing happens in the PT. The leadership and the national meeting had the courage to say: "neither of these candidates takes the interests of the workers into account. We are therefore not going to take the risk of calling for a vote for one or the other. We want to explain to the inhabitants of Sao Paolo and the other provinces that the best thing to do today is cast a blank ballot."
This was a moral decision. However, the votes are secret and no one controls them. But we think that a good proportion of the PT militants followed our advice. The fact that many supporters and sympathisers voted for Fleury does not undermine either the national conference nor the leadership.
We made only one mistake: a week after the first round, the leadership began to talk publicly about the blank vote. We
BRAZIL
C TRABALHO in the face of the government and the crisis. The CUT has criticized this and worked out an alternative document.
• You mentioned the importance of the "parallel gov-
UM ANO DE COLLOR ernment", but in reality this
Greve Geral como? pg. 4/5 Projetão NÃO! pg. 4/5 PT no: Fórum? pg. 6 should have explained that we were opening a debate on the subject and proposed a preliminary consultation in the PT.
But, in any case, the PT carries no responsibility for other parties' candidates. If this is not made clear at the top, the people will never be educated, and we will just be tail-ending.
The PT's first congress must also discuss what we mean by democracy. Many people say: "my choice is a personal question. And therefore I will vote how I want." But in that case, what is the point of the party? I believe that individual liberty ends where the collective will begins. But you have to have guarantees that collective liberty is conducted in the most democratic fashion possible, with as much debate as possible and plenty of transparency.
I think that before any national decision is taken, any member of the PT can put forward his point of view and express it publicly, but that when the party has voted and taken a position, then we are all obliged to defend it. • In public as well?
Obviously. If I went on saying that, despite the PT's decision, I still think that something else is better, then there is no point in the party taking a position. There would be no reason to have a party. I don't see this in terms of punishing those that do not respect decisions, but it is necessary to establish a dialogue with them, so that they come to understand what democratic internal coexistence is. I, for example, support the notion of the holding of a meeting between the national leadership and the PT's elected representatives to establish a policy for relations between the party and the executive. • There remains a certain distance between union militants and party activists. Recently, the United Workers Centre (CUT) took a position different to that of the PT when the union decided to take part in what was called the "national accord" [ the discussion relating to negotiations between bosses and unions]. What do you think of this?
I think that at certain moments there are going to be differences, all the more in that the CUT and the PT are not the same. The union confederation is broader than the party; in the CUT there are comrades from the Communist Party of Brazil (Pc do B - pro-Albanian) and the Brazilian Communist Party (PCB — pro-Soviet). We want the CUT to be representative of the whole Brazilian working class.
We need to develop the practise of PT comrades involved on the CUT leadership coming to the party leadership meetings with the right to vote so that they carry our ideas into the CUT. At the moment no such relationship exists and they are hard to establish - this problem needs to be tackled at the PT congress.
The CUT attended a meeting with the employers, but when it tried to put forward its proposals it became clear what a farce the meeting was. The bosses want to see the working class capitulate project has encountered numerous difficulties. I am happy to see that this initiative is beginning to awaken interest in the PT's members. People are expecting a lot from this "parallel government" which was set up on July 15, 1990, during the election campaign. But the PT, like the whole country, is going through an unprecedented economic crisis. Every week we have to go looking for loans for the party. This has had an impact on the "parallel government" which can only afford a very limited structure - there are only four full time staff and we lack the means to take up themes in a coordinated way. We need to develop projects for each sector and more systematically follow official policy, to create a counter-weight to Collor's govemment. Around June 1991, the "parallel government" will have been consolidated and will become a reference point for Brazilian society.
Those taking part in it must become real political actors; they are outstanding personalities from the social and intellectual movements, but not people used to politics. • What is the PT's international role? Over the past two years, your external initiatives have continually grown.
I am not perhaps the person best placed to talk about this, because I am very immodest about this! I think that the PT was the big political novelty on the international scene in the 1980s. Before wandering off, the Polish Solidarnosc union awakened great interest at the start of the 1980s, but it cannot be compared to the 1. The proposal for the "parallel govemment" came from Lula himself in July 1990 after the presidential elections in 1989, with the intention of keeping together the forces that supported his candidacy for the presidency and putting forward an alternative to the policies of president Collor. It is made up of coordinators of sectors of work, corresponding more or less to the ministries. It above all involves PT militants and some others from other parties or without party affiliation. It has proved impossible to keep together all the forces involved in the election campaign. The "parallel govemment" has already worked out its alternative projects for education, health, the development of the north-east, agriculture, wages and so on. It aims to be a permanent centre for all opposition to the government's projects and show that another policy is possible. However it is dependent on a some- 9 what reluctant media for its work becoming known. June 10, 1991 • #208 International Viewpoint
BASTA
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PT. A party with the characteristics of the PT — its ability to bring together very different modes of thought, from Communists to Christians, from supporters of the Cuban model to people who support something quite else — is a rarity in history. The PT opens up a big political space: it has given us all an education in democratic coexistence, and in Europe, both East and West, there is great interest in our experiences.
But we do not know how to correctly work on our image abroad. We need to send regular information on the PT to the rest of the world, so that people can follow our evolution more closely.
At its inception in 1980 the PT knocked down the Berlin Wall. At the time many were already saying that it was impossible to create a party if it did not respect the right to union organization, the right to strike and political pluralism and which did not try to implicate society in all its debates. This conception allowed the PT to discuss the problems of the international left. Despite this we retain a certain humility with regard to parties in other countries - perhaps a relic of colonialism.
The fact that we are not tied to any international is important. The fact that we have relations with all democratic forces on all continents gives us great credibility.
The PT has not yet taken account of the need to have a department for international relations, to give it means and strengthen it. The more weight it has on the international scene, the more the PT will be able to open up an unprecedented space in Brazilian politics. • What is your opinion of the different currents on the Latin American left? Who are our main fellow travellers?
It is difficult to make predictions here, because there are very diverse currents in Latin American. In Argentina, for example, there are 13 left wing parties, and it is not easy to select a privileged ally. We have, for example, fraternal relations with the Broad Front in Uruguay, the Sandinistas in Nicaragua and the Farabundo Martí Front in El Salvador. In Argentina, Mexico and Venezuela we have decided to establish links with the largest possible number of left wing forces. This makes us more credible; we do not shut anyone out and we work in a way that makes the unity of the Latin American left and trade unions a possibility. • Currently, in your opinion, what are the main challenges facing the left on the international scene?
The left is perplexed. After the fall of the Berlin Wall and the advent of perestroika, it is reflecting on its mistakes. 10 the people lin Eastem Europs va that Many find it difficult to understand that real change. In these countries, socialism had become bureaucratic and rancid; it did not meet the challenge of modernization nor of productivity nor of democracy. In that part of the world, the left has proved unable to initiate changes. The right has been able to draw succor from this and profit from changes that should have been made by a section of the left.
This has had serious implications here in Brazil as in the rest of Latin America, since many parties were really nothing more than satellites of Eastern bloc groups or the Soviet Communist Party. The left must understand that it is up to the masses to develop their own socialist project; it must learn that it is impossible to create a vanguard party if the masses do not themselves become the vanguard. • Are you satisfied by Lech Walesa's victory in Poland?
It is hard to have an opinion on this question without knowing the Polish context. I do not want to give a hasty opinion. Nonetheless it is quite possible that Walesa no longer has the same positions as before as a defender of the aspirations and gains of the workers. It is true that socialism did not exist in Poland and that a bureaucracy was fixed in power, but to go from there to choosing the market economy and proposing a return to capitalism as the solution to the country's problems...
I think that Walesa should get out and about a bit, and see that capitalism is not just European capitalism but also what exists in Africa, Asia or Latin America. He should take account of the fact that we do not enjoy the splendid modernity of Europe, but misery. That as it may be, Walesa is a worker who has got to where he is today; I hope that he will turn out to have enough serenity and maturity to contribute to improving the situation of the Polish people. • In 1991 we will hold the first congress of the PT. One of the central themes of the discussion will be the question of socialism and the strategy we need to get to it.
In my opinion, we must be a lot more pragmatic at this congress than before, for the PT has the perspective of coming to power in 1994. I think we must formulate our "utopia" on concrete foundations drawn from ten years of experience. We have to consider a socialist project which corresponds to our reality; and thus have a mature discussion that is as far reaching as possible. The time will have come for the different currents that make up the PT to stop trying to impose their particular visions of socialism and consider what type of socialism the PT wants. Our party runs important cities and may perhaps govern big provinces or even find itself winning the presidency.
The PT has to stop making proposals for the distant future and put forward
International Viewpoint #208 • June 10, 1991 solutions for the here and now. We must have the discussion on socialism with sectors that are not in the PT, from the union and popular movement; otherwise we will simply have a "vanguardist" project — and on the whole the masses do not understand such projects.
The congress can carry through this task and I think it could constitute an exceptional event which would allow the party a very wide-ranging discussion on important topics. • What is your view of the present situation in the PT?
For an organization with only ten years behind it, the PT is extraordinarily mature. However we still have a sort of anti-alliance culture, against political agreements and are incapable of distinguishing the different levels of a discussion.
As far as alliances are concerned, for example, the PT must always be disposed to them; it is a tactical question depending on the situation, which does not involve the breaking of principles or the abandonment of the perspective of taking power.
While our rhetoric is "rank-and-filist", in fact we have to improve the participation of the rank-and-file, both in the PT's basic units and in the social movements. In fact, the rank-and-file has hardly taken part in our decisions since our local bodies do not function well and many parts of our society live in such a way that they cannot effectively take part in the life of the PT.
We have not yet succeeded in getting the People's Councils off the ground in the town halls, when we have run some of them for two years. We have led a campaign on people's power and participation, but it all remains to a large extent up in the air.
How to draw the population in? Evidently via such councils and the PT's own structures. We have to overcome all these contradictions and difficulties: the importance of the PT is not only to be measured in electoral scores; it is above all a function of its involvement in the social movement, and its organizational and educational achievements. *
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The best laid Plans of George Bush THE unexpected victory of the right wing UNO alliance in the Nicaraguan elections of February 1990 shows the degree of success of the policies of the Bush administration in Latin America. Its military and political offensive has allowed Washington not only to regain the initiative in Central America in the framework of its bilateral relations with the region's conservative governments, but also to turn to its advantage the peace negotiations in El Salvador and the transition period in Nicaragua.
In the rest of Latin America, the Sandinista defeat, coming after the US invasion of Panama, has led the governments there to reassess the balance of forces with the imperial power. From Mexico's Salinas de Gortari to Argentina's Carlos Menem, the Latin American presidents are falling over each other in their willingness to collaborate with Washington and to ask for aid for their countries.
However, despite all the problems facing the Latin American left, including the increasing pressure on an isolated Cuba, the imperialist plans are not having a smooth run. G. BUSTER
LATIN AMERICA the debate on aid to El Salvador sparked off by assassination of six Jesuits in November 1989 revived. While Bush might proclaim that the US was in control throughout the continent, that country was in no position to finance development or subsidize social stability there.
According to the New York Times, the US president's first Latin American tour was the occasion for a dialogue of the deaf: "while Bush talked about democracy, the Latin American presidents spoke about the debt." After attempted coup d'états in Panama and Argentina, a renewed FMLN offensive in El Salvador and the victory of the M-19 ex-guerillas in the legislative elections in Colombia, it is easy to understand why Bush was met with a certain scepticism.
The combined effects of the invasion of Panama and the Sandinista defeat, and the enormous psychological shock it caused, led both the Latin American left and Washington to an over-hasty reading of the real balance of forces.
In Central America, the two general strikes led by the National Front of Workers (FNT — which brings together the Sandinista unions) against the neo-liberal policies of Violetta Chamorro and the revanchist actions of the most extreme sections of the UNO government coincided with the political resurgence of the FMLN. The Salvadoran revolutionaries carried through a change of strategy with respect to the negotiations, which allowed them to avoid the traps set by the imperi- them to avoid the traps set by the impenalist strategy, while weakening the Cristiani government. Furthermore, throughout Latin America, the working class has been resisting the adjustment policies via more or less important general strikes in the Dominican Republic, Peru, Colombia, Ecuador, Argentina and
Brazil.