Brazil under the Rule of the Pro-Imperialistic Goverment Lula

DEMONSTRATIONS AGAINST

LULA DA SILVA

PARALYSE BRASÍLIA

Organisation and Translation from PSTU’s Newspaper Opinião Socialista - December 2004 :
www.pstu.org.br
by Eduardo de Almeida Neto
Albuquerque Lemes
Lo Scaltro von Genua

 emilvonmuenchen@web.de

On 25 November 2004 Brasília was shaken by two demonstrations against the government Lula. This year will end under the sign of street mobilizations to end and points out at the same time to the perspective of a fierce 2005.

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 emilvonmuenchen@web.de

On November 25, 2004, Brasília was shaken by two demonstrations against the pro-imperialistic Government Lula.
One of these was the march against the neo-liberal trade union and work reforms, called up by the National Trade Union of the Lecturers of the Universities (ANDES: Sindicato Nacional Dos Docentes das Instituições de Ensino Superior), the National Co-ordination of the Struggles (CONLUTAS: Coordenação Nacional das Lutas) and several other organizations, which paralyse the main street of the Brazilian Ministries with circa 15,000 people.
The second demonstration was that of the Landless Rural Workers’ Movement (MST: Movimento dos Trabalhadores Rurais Sem Terra) with 9,000 people, which was formed after the Conference on Land and Water.
This one ended before the Central Bank of Brazil and was instructed by the leadership of the MST not to demonstrate directly against the Government Lula but only against the Lula’s Finance Minister, Antônio Palocci, and its financial policy.
For this reason the leadership of the MST refused to unite with the other demonstration. Meanwhile, the reality prevailed and it showed that also this march according to its content was a manifestation against the Government Lula Silva.
November 25, 2004, was dominated by the third large manifestation against the Government Lula.
In 2003 we had a mobilization of 50,000 people in the framework of the strikes of officials and employees against the neo-liberal Lula’s reform of the social assurance system.
On June 16, 2004, the CONLUTAS brought again in Brasília 20,000 demonstrators on the road against the neo-liberal trade union, work and university reforms.
This year will end under the sign of street mobilizations to end and points out at the same time to the perspective of a fierce 2005.



The sectors in the march



The march against the Lula’s neo-liberal reforms was a victory. It combined sectors with different weights.
The first demonstration was built by the CONLUTAS and the National Co-ordination of the Students’ Struggles (CONLUTE: Coordenação Nacional de Luta dos Estudantes) and represented half of the march, so that they were to be well recognized.
Together with many militants, also the Unified Socialist Workers’ Party (PSTU: Partido Socialista dos Trabalhadores Unificado) was well visible in the march: by their size, by the speech choirs against the Government Lula, against the United Workers’ Trade Union Federation (CUT: Central Única dos Trabalhadores) and the National Union of Students (UNE: União Nacional dos Estudantes) and by the enormous dolls of Olinda, banners and posters.
The column of CONLUTAS was composed of parts of the trade union movement of the whole country and of the young people, which built the majority of this column together with comrades of the University of Brasília (UnB: Universidade Nacional de Brasília), University of Campinas (UNICAMP), University of Rio de Janeiro (UFR: Universidade Federal DO Rio de Janeiro) and other universities.
The left of the CUT and of the Workers’ Party (PT: Partido dos Trabalhadores) was the second force in the march, had however much less enthusiasm. They held neither flags of the PT nor of the CUT and disappeared visually and politically into the demonstration.
The Party for Socialism and Liberty (P-SOL: Partido Socialismo e Liberdade) of Heloísa Helena arises for the first time in this march with banners and flags and clasped also a column of the Movement Land and Liberty (MTL: Movimento Terra e Liberdade).
It is still time for breaking with the Government Lula, the CUT and the UNE

in January 2005 on the World Social Forum (WSF) in Porto Alegre !
The two demonstrations of November 25, 2004, in Brasília expressed the feeling of a whole part of the mass movement against the pro-imperialistic Government Lula.
But contrary to what happened in the elections of October 2004, this feeling was not exploited by the right opposition, because the march was organized by left sectors, which stand in connection with the mass movement.
The militant basis concentrated in the two marches had a confrontation position against the Government Lula da Silva.
This happened both in the march of the main street of the Ministries against the neo-liberal trade union, work and university reforms, and in the march of the landless rural workers.
The two fierce demonstrations were even more left than parts of their leadership, as the MST, the CUT and PT left leaderships, which did not break yet with the government.
The Government Lula in turn follows its course with absolute clarity.

The agrarian reform is shut down throughout Brazil and has altogether a lower number of settlements than that one of the Cardoso’s Government.
Lula da Silva prepares the neo-liberal trade union, work, and university reforms, which open the way to the Free Trade Agreement of Americas (FTAA/ALCA) with the USA.
The nepotism in the Lula’s Government becomes obvious in the context of the negotiations with the bourgeois Party of the Democratic Movement of Brazil (PMDB: Partido do Movimento Democrático Brasileiro) and the bourgeois Progress Party (PP: Partido Progressista) of Paulo Maluf, practicing an impudent exchange of offices and Ministries for political support.



The CUT and the UNE are still connected with the Government Lula and prepare together with this the neo-liberal reforms

Eye-catching, is the fact that the leadership of the MST continues to support the government, exactly like the PT left.
An important part of the Heloísa Helena’s P-SOL Helena is still against the break with the CUT and the UNE.
We draw two conclusions from the mobilizations of November 25, 2004, in Brasília:
The first is that the combination of the marches in a unique large march against the Government Lula da Silva was possible.
The second is that the leadership of the MST must break with the big agrarian business compromised Lula’s Government, exactly like the left sectors of CUT, UNE, P-SOL must break with these government-faithful institutions and build an alternative to the leadership of the workers’ fights together with CONLUTAS in the context of the National Meeting of January 2005 on the World Social Forum (WSF) in Porto Alegre.

How does the PSTU of Brazil work?

The PSTU of Brazil works on the basis of the principle of the democratic centralism.
That is, all comrades of our organization act according to the same program and the same policy, after that a party-internal democratic discussion took place.
The centralization of the party actions is necessary, because we confront ourselves with the bourgeoisie and with the bourgeois state.
Without a centralized structure it is not possibly to fight for power.
In order to secure the centralization in the action, we have an extensive liberty for internal discussion: Each politics are constantly discussed and estimated by the comrades in the meetings of our organization.
The internal democracy means the possibility and the necessity that the party experiences an extensive debate among the different positions.
The large political and programmatic decisions are made on our congress.
In the preparation times of these congresses there is the possibility of expressing these differences and of developing also tendencies and fractions (i.e. groups of comrades, which organize themselves for the support of their suggestions).
But, as far as the policy on the congress is decided, the tendencies and fractions dissolve and the comrades commit themselves to convert into the practice the policy which was determined by the majority.
Many independent activists and the majority of the militants of other parties and organizations do not know or have many doubts about this democratic centralism.
The chief responsible for this confusion is the Stalinism, which did not only pave the way for the dictatorship of only one party into the former workers’ states, but also for the bureaucratic centralism within the communist parties, in which the leadership decides and the basis obeys.
He, who had other political opinion, was ejected, slandered or even killed.
Thus it happened in time of Stalin that, in order to accomplish its bureaucratic counter-revolution, the workers’ democracy, which existed in time of Lenin and Trotsky in the Bolshevik party, was destroyed and nearly all of their leaders were killed.
Other comrades are deceived by apparent "democracy", which exists in parties like the Brazilian Workers’ Party (PT) of Lula da Silva.
In truth there is at all no democracy in the Workers’ Party (PT) of Lula da Silva.
Then, who decides the policy of this party is the party summit, which is occupied with governors, mayors and parliamentarians, exactly the same as in the bourgeois parties.
The basis of the Workers’ Party (PT) of São Paulo, Recife, Porto Alegre or Belém does not decide on what the mayors will make.
In Brazil the activists of the basis of the Workers’ Party (PT) were against an alliance with the Liberal Party (PL) of José Alencar, but the leadership and the "congress" (on which it is only possible to conquer the majority, if one controls the bourgeois apparatuses; on which one operates mass co-optations of new members, in order to gather votes without discussion) have imposed the liberal Alencar in bureaucratic way.
The militant basis is against the neo-liberal health reform and also against the remaining reforms of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and of the Free Trade Agreement of Americas (FTAA /ALCA).
But the leadership of the Workers’ Party (PT) of Lula Silva and the adherents of its government operate what they want to do.
The left activists, which revolt against this politics of the leadership of the Workers’ Party (PT) of Brazil, are punished or threatened with the exclusion.
Democratic centralism is by historical experience the only method, which guarantees that all members of the party, from the leadership up to the basis, participate at the elaboration of the party politics, at the definition of a strong and effective policy, in which nobody is privileged, in order to convert it thereafter into reality together.