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 Let's use the Rio de Janeiro example knowing that the same happens with a boring similitude in almost every state of Brazil. The Left doesn't seem to learn. They are always divided and when they are split they can't go any place. In addition to the candidates from the center or from the right, Sergio Cabral Filho (PMDB party), Eduardo Paes (PSDB) and Marcelo Crivela (PRB), four suitors have the same origin.
Perhaps united, with only one name, the chosen candidate might get at least to the second round, if not being able to assure a pole position. Carlos Lupi (PDT), Vladimir Palmeira (PT), Milton Temer (PSOL) and Denise Frossard (PPS), despite their distinct characteristics, express the selfsame electorate and the same carioca feeling of opposition. They even leave in a quandary the citizen who in the recent past, helped elect late leftist Leonel Brizola twice and Marcello Alencar once. It's not important to know who should be chosen as candidate, but if the contenders possessed a little more of public spirit and a little less vanity they would build an alliance. Imagine now multiplying the Rio situation to the whole country with some touches of recent presidential elections. In 1989, for example, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, Leonel Brizola, Mário Covas, Ulysses Guimarães, Roberto Freire, all from the left, went their own way. Result: Fernando Collor became Brazil's president. In Brazil, the left by nature is incapable of getting united. They are more stubborn in the disputes among themselves than in face of the real adversary. Only by miracle they'll be able to win. Shadow Betting that opposition candidate Geraldo Alckmin from the PSDB will get to the second round in the dispute with President Lula, toucans (from the PSDB) and liberal politicians are already getting ready for such a scenario using good will gestures towards both alternative candidates, Heloísa Helena and Cristovam Buarque. In a forced matter-of-fact way, the PSDB and the PFL are starting to praise the warrior's qualities of the PSOL candidate (Helena), adding that she would make an excellent Social Services minister in any administration. As for the PDT candidate, Buarque, they say that the man who once was the best Education Minister the country ever had since Gustavo Capanema could once again occupy that post. No concrete proposal will ever be made now or later, but the sound of the praises gives the tone to the orchestra. Alckmin, always ready to lambaste Lula, never refers to the other two in an inelegant manner is spite of being the target of Heloísa and Cristovam's repeated harsh criticism. Once defeated in the first round, both will join in a united opposition front. There is no chance they would support a Lula reelection. Heloísa Helena was expelled from the PT for the crime of having an opinion, after having rebelled in the Senate against neoliberal reforms of her party. She will never forget the humiliation she went through, and to top it all she became the heir of the PT's program and preaching, when Lula and his aides suffered a life-changing metamorphosis. As for Cristovam, the situation is even worse. Cristovam had started a revolutionary tenure in the Education Ministry, awaking jealousies not only from José Dirceu, at the time Lula's right-hand man, but also from the president himself. He was fired by phone, when in a mission in Portugal. If the opinion of both can influence people, after they lose in the first round, they might not come out positively in favor of Alckmin, but for sure they will be in the frontline of Lula's critics. That's well deserved for the formerly arrogant members of the gang denounced by the Republic's attorney general. Third Wave If we agree that the second wave of animality that ran rampant in São Paulo is cooling down, then we have to ask: When will the third wave start? Some people fear that it might coincide with the October elections. The organized crime in interested in demoralizing the institutions, establishing a reign of terror in the streets so that the population becomes aware of whom is the real boss in the state. The pretext is that the Mafia's bosses are being roughed up in jail and being transferred to maximum safety penitentiaries. A flimsy pretext, since the public power in Brazil shivers with fear in face of the rare transfers. We shouldn't conclude that the organized crime is at the service of this or that party. Nonsense, unless you can prove this story that there is an understanding between the PT and the PCC (First Command of the Capital). In reality, crime honcho Marcola and his followers want the demoralization of all parties.
Let's suppose that on election day some precincts are targeted by the PCC. Many people would rather pay the fine for not casting the mandatory vote than getting into long lines that can be hit by Molotov cocktails or by not-exactly-stray bullets... Carlos Chagas writes for the Rio’s daily Tribuna da Imprensa and is a representative of the Brazilian Press Association, in Brasília. He welcomes your comments at
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. Translated from the Portuguese by Arlindo Silva.
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