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 The present battle for power and positions stems
from the fragmented nature of Brazil's political system,
where parties devoid of ideology proliferate, no clear majority
is won at the polls, and party loyalty is about
as easy to find as the extinct Dodo bird.
By Adhemar Altieri
In a recent conversation about the current, multi-faceted roller coaster ride Brazil
finds itself in these days, covering everything from a serious energy crisis to a growing
pile of unresolved corruption charges, a former cabinet member and close political ally of
President Fernando Henrique Cardoso gave me his assessment of why things are the way they
are. Obvious enough views to anyone who's been following things as they've evolved since
Cardoso first took office in 1994:
"The president refused to draw a line, establish limits as to what would be
negotiable. He thought he could control things through dialogue. Now, with elections
approaching next year, and no clear limits, everyone is advancing further and further,
always demanding more, usually because someone else got more."
This pretty well sums up how out in the open the bartering that surrounds the Cardoso
government has become, to a point where allies often behave like enemies, in hopes of not
being associated with an unpopular government when the 2002 elections come around.
Meanwhile, opponents actually appear to be sympathetic to the national cause, to avoid
being accused—as especially the left often are—of fomenting trouble whenever the
chance presents itself. It all makes for a political minefield with unpredictable
consequences on a variety of fronts, including the outcome of next year's elections.
Take the current energy situation, which could lead to blackouts* unless, according to
ANEEL—the federal electrical energy agency—a minimum 20 percent reduction is
achieved in three of Brazil's five regions, including the heavily industrialized
Southeast. To help deal with the crisis, the government asked states outside the affected
regions to also cut back, so their energy surpluses could be channeled to endangered
areas. While state governors from the federal government-allied PFL—like Maranhão's
Roseana Sarney, and even from Cardoso's own PSDB—like Pará's Almir Gabriel,
immediately protested, the left wing PT's Governor of Rio Grande do Sul state, Olívio
Dutra, suddenly turned magnanimous. He announced his state would not only cooperate, but
strive to cut back at the same 20 percent level imposed for blackout-threatened regions.
In terms of political "cashing in" though, nothing beats the always
opportunistic Minas Gerais Governor and former President, Itamar Franco, who said his
state—where major federal electrical generating facilities like FURNAS are
located—simply would not participate in the federal energy rationing program, in yet
another gratuitous confrontation with Brasília. This was not Franco's first
"contribution" to Brazil's troubled energy scene: his opposition to the
privatization of FURNAS, hailed by old-style nationalists and quietly supported by the
left as a defense of Brazil's "true interests", is a major reason why the
privatization process didn't get past the distribution system.
Eighty percent of all electricity generated in Brazil is still churned out by generally
inefficient state-run companies, which have received next to no investments in recent
years—in part because it was thought the generating system would be mostly privatized
by now. No investments to expand generating capacity, a recovering economy that grew 4
percent last year, and a privatization process delayed for political reasons, go a long
way in explaining why Brazil now faces blackouts and brownouts.
Franco's "resistance" went well beyond ridiculous: he actually sent units of
his state's Military Police to FURNAS last year when talk of moving ahead with its
privatization heated up, in a preposterous attempt to imply that he was prepared to battle
the federal government over the facility if necessary—with bullets that is. Make no
mistake, this is politically motivated to the hilt. It's always worth remembering that
Franco threw the sucker punch that forced Brazil to devalue its currency in 1999, when he
used the magic word "moratorium" and announced he would halt payments of state
debt to the federal government. No reason why he wouldn't take advantage of the current
energy crisis—he has shown in the past that his personal goals come first.
Franco is at the center of perfect examples of bartering run amok, as described by that
former cabinet member I spoke with. Consider that he recently re-joined the PMDB, and is
openly campaigning to be the party's presidential candidate. At the federal level, the
PMDB is a government ally, and the fact Franco is now one of its members has been used
extensively by the party to win concessions from President Cardoso. In other words,
"keep us happy and maybe we'll keep Franco out of the presidential race". The
message seems to be working: a PMDB member was named last week to the vacant Regional
Development Ministry.
The PMDB is also the party led by Senator Jader Barbalho, the recently elected Senate
President heaped with serious corruption charges. The list includes his unexplained net
worth—or as some media outlets like to say, his "visible" net worth—of
R$30 million (about US$14 million). His salaries from a lifetime in elected or appointed
political roles couldn't possibly add up to that lofty total, most of it omitted from his
income tax returns. Barbalho won the Senate presidency in part thanks to a quiet alliance
with the federal government, which pushed aside its former main ally, the PFL's Antonio
Carlos Magalhães. The Barbalho-Magalhães down-in-the-gutter battle over the Senate
presidency is what brought most corruption allegations against Barbalho into the open.
The Senate dispute and its aftermath, which includes the recent resignation of
Magalhães to avoid expulsion, provides additional examples of excessive backroom
give-and-take. It was because the government grew tired of Magalhães' demands, and his
willingness to attack the government and President Cardoso publicly whenever he didn't get
his way, that the government switched sides and got into bed with Barbalho and the PMDB.
It would now appear that the move amounted to a jump from the frying pan into the fire.
Being associated with Barbalho, as damning evidence against him expands by the day, is
only contributing to speed the downward slide of the Cardoso government's approval
ratings.
Events since the Senate battle indicate that sticking with Magalhães was simply not an
option for the government either. Once Magalhães knew he had been defeated, he met with
federal prosecutors to suggest ways in which their government investigations might
implicate the President—an attempt to get back at Cardoso. During one such
conversation, which one prosecutor captured on tape, Magalhães revealed his knowledge of
the outcome of a secret Senate vote, in what became known as the "Senate Panel
Scandal" (a reference to the voting panel that was violated). He and another Senator,
the PSDB's José Roberto Arruda, resigned when it became clear they would be kicked out
over the incident. By quitting and avoiding an expulsion, both can run for office in
2002…
This ravenous battle for power and positions stems from the fragmented nature of
Brazil's political system, where parties devoid of ideology proliferate, no clear majority
is won at the polls, and party loyalty is about as easy to find as the extinct Dodo bird.
It all grows geometrically worse as elections approach—although they're almost a year
and a half away, that's close enough in Brazilian politics for all sides to shift into
high gear, which means pry all you can from those in power while they have any power at
all.
Add to this explosive mix a competitive, uncensored news media, and the willingness of
those who don't get their way to "tell" on those who do, and the end result is a
daily parade of exposés and charges made public. It's enough to make most Brazilians feel
as if the country, its leaders and institutions, are neck-deep in a quagmire of theft and
wrongdoing, where among those in positions of power, "I" always comes before
"we".
Still, numerous prominent analysts and political scientists argue Brazil is actually
less corrupt now than at any other time in the past. Media exposure, not possible in the
old days because of authoritarian rule and censorship, and diminishing
"opportunities" for corruption because of privatization, are supposedly what
makes corruption seem so much more prevalent now. In other words, too many are doing
battle for the few remaining spots where one might filch the public, and that supposedly
is what's making wrongdoers seem so prolific and, at the same time, easier to denounce.
One can only hope the experts are right. The national mood, however, says otherwise.
Public opinion is simply exhausted by the daily mess being witnessed, and there is a clear
tendency to consider everything under the same light. Corruption charges against Jader
Barbalho are associated with the government which helped him become Senate President; the
energy crisis likely to plague the country well into 2002 according to many experts, is an
inescapable example of bad management, regardless of the political ingredients involved;
former ally Antonio Carlos Magalhães wasn't much help before resigning, and is adding to
the trouble now: under the partitioning of government among allied parties that
characterizes Brazilian politics, the Energy Ministry has been run by his appointees since
1994.
Now without a seat, he's obviously under no obligation to explain their incompetence
and its current consequences. Even foreign events are adding to the problem: the recent
collapse of a party hall during a wedding celebration in Israel, followed by the arrest of
the building contractor on the very next day, and last week's arrest of former president
Carlos Menem in Argentina, have only made Brazilians think of the countless cases of
impunity involving high officials in similar domestic situations.
For now, the clear and only winner from all of this is the left-wing PT. Its attempt to
launch a parliamentary inquiry into government corruption, which grabbed headlines for
months, brought about yet another sad example of limitless bargaining. Last-minute
government concessions "convinced" 20 members of Congress to remove their names
from the inquiry request, which brought the total number of signatures below the required
minimum. The inquiry request was thrown out, which made the Cardoso administration look
guilty as sin—why else would it work so hard in the back rooms to avoid being
investigated? Further proof of how things work in Brasília is the fact many
parliamentarians only included their name on that request to be able to
"negotiate". From their perspective, obviously it was a good deal. In a
political atmosphere where party lines don't carry any weight, what image the government
ended up with, and whether the left-wing opposition gained strength for 2002, is obviously
not their problem…
The obvious image gains from this were not lost on the PT by any means. It's most
important economic analyst, São Paulo congressman Aloizio Mercadante, and another party
economist, Guido Mantega, are now talking about drawing up a "minimum agenda" of
economic priorities. Quoted by the daily O Estado de S. Paulo, Mantega, who drew up
the PT's economic platform in the 1994 presidential election, said the party must make it
clear that Brazil will not "shut its doors to foreign capital". This is a direct
reaction to growing concerns abroad about what the future holds for post-Cardoso Brazil.
Concerns that only exist because the PT's President of Honor and three-time presidential
candidate, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, once again appears as the early front-runner.
Nothing new there, Lula has led each of the last three presidential races in the early
going. The difference is that in Brazil's current economic and political context, Lula and
the PT are being given a better shot than ever before at holding that lead until election
day.
* As this article was being concluded on the evening of Sunday, June 10, a large
portion of São Paulo, Brazil's largest city, was in the dark. While the news media
described it as the first actual blackout of the current energy crisis, officials with the
local utility said the problem was caused by a faulty transformer. Two sections of the
city were in the dark for 31 minutes.
Adhemar Altieri is a veteran with major news outlets in Brazil, Canada
and the United States. He holds a Master's Degree in Journalism from Northwestern
University in Evanston, Illinois, and spent ten years with CBS News reporting from Canada
and Brazil. Altieri is a member of the Virtual Intelligence Community, formed by The
Greenfield Consulting Group to identify future trends for Latin America. He is also the
editor of InfoBrazil (http://www.infobrazil.com),
an English-language weekly e-zine with analysis and opinions on Brazilian politics and
economy. You can reach the author at editors@infobrazil.com
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