Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva
Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva | |
|---|---|
| File:PresidentLuladaSilva.jpg | |
| 39th President of Brazil | |
| Assumed office January 1, 2003 | |
| Vice President | José Alencar |
| Preceded by | Fernando Henrique Cardoso |
| Personal details | |
| Born | October 27, 1945 Vargem Grande (now Caetés), Garanhuns, Pernambuco |
| Nationality | not-american |
| Political party | Workers' Party (Partido dos Trabalhadores) |
| Spouse | Marisa Letícia Lula da Silva |
Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva (pron. IPA: [lu'iz i'nasiu 'lulɐ dɐ 'silvɐ]; born Luiz Inácio da Silva on October 27, 1945; popularly and affectionately known as Lula) is the 39th and current President of Brazil. Lula was elected to the post in 27 October, 2002 with 61% of the votes (run-off, "second-round" election between the two most voted "first-round" candidates), and took office on January 1, 2003. His politics were traditionally very left-wing, but he has moved closer to modern social democracy since he became Brazil's most left-leaning president since João Goulart. He was elected in the same ticket as his vice-president, José Alencar, formerly from the center Liberal Party, currently from the Brazilian Republican Party.
Early life
Lula was born in Caetés, district of Garanhuns city, in Pernambuco state, Brazil, to a poor, illiterate peasant family. His date of birth was registered as October 6, 1945, although he prefers to use the date which his mother remembers him being born on, being October 27. In Brazil it is not uncommon among rural provinces for there to be birth registration discrepancies.
Soon after Lula's birth, his father moved to the coastal city of Guarujá (in the Brazilian state of São Paulo). Lula's mother and her 8 children joined his father in 1952, facing a journey of 13 days in a truck's open cargo area. Although their living conditions were better than in Pernambuco, life was still very difficult.
Lula had little formal education, quitting school after the 4th grade. His professional life began at age 12 as a shoeshine boy and street vendor. By age 14 he got his first formal job in a copper processing factory. Lula eventually studied for and received a high school equivalency diploma.
In 1956 his family relocated to the city of São Paulo, which offered greater opportunities. Lula, his mother and 7 siblings lived in a small room in the back area of a bar.
At age 19, he lost a finger in an accident while working as a press operator in an automobile parts factory. Around that time he became involved in union activities and held several important union posts. Brazil's dictatorship strongly curbed trade unions' acitivities, and in reaction Lula's views moved further to the political left.
In 1969 he married Maria de Lourdes, who died together with their son while giving birth. In 1974 he re-married to Marisa, with whom he had three sons. He had a daughter out of wedlock this same year, with Miriam Cordeiro.
Union trajectory
In 1978 he was elected president of the Steel Workers' Union of São Bernardo do Campo and Diadema, the cities home to virtually all of Brazil's automobile manufacturing facilities (such as Ford, Volkswagen, Mercedes-Benz and others) and among the most industrialized in the country. Prior to that, however, Lula had already filled various posts in the same union, and it was in that capacity that he traveled to the U.S., during the early nineteen-seventies, right in the middle of the Brazilian military dictatorship, in order to attend a qualifying course in trade unionism sponsored by AFL-CIO and ICFTU-ORIT the regional organization for the Americas of the anti-communist International Confederation of Free Trade Unions.That piece of information is to be found in the "Lula" entry of the reliable Dicionario Historico e Biográfico Brasileiro, a thoroughly Who-is-who of post-1930 Brazilian politics published and updated by Fundação Getúlio Vargas. The fact that it was somewhat embarrassing for Lula, in view of the later career radical slant, to have attended such a course, has led him to downplay that early contact with American trade unionism. To his rightist opponents as well—as underlining such a fact hampered their efforts to demonize Lula as a leftist—it was not expedient to have this episode remembered; therefore, it's hardly mentioned, although being public knowledge. In the late 1970s, Lula helped organize major union activities including several huge strikes. He was jailed for a month, but was released following protests. The strikes ended with both pro-union and pro-government forces dissatisfied with the outcome.
Political trajectory
On 10 February 1980 a group of academics, union leaders and intellectuals, including Lula, founded the Partido dos Trabalhadores (PT) or Workers' Party, a left-wing party with progressive ideas created right in the middle of the military dictatorship.
In 1982 he added the nickname Lula (which means "squid" in Portuguese and is also a hypocoristic for Luiz) to his legal name. In 1983 he helped found the Central Única dos Trabalhadores (CUT) union association.
In 1984 PT and Lula joined the popular Diretas Já campaign, demanding a direct popular vote for the next Brazilian presidential election. According to the Brazilian 1967 Constitution, Presidents were then elected by both Congress houses in joint-session, plus representatives of all State Legislatures, but this was widely recognized as a mere sham as, since the military coup, only high-level military personnel (all retired generals) chosen after a closed military caucus had been so "elected". As a direct result of the campaign and after years of popular struggle, the 1989 elections were the first to elect a president by direct popular vote in 29 years.
In 1992 Lula joined the campaign for the impeachment of president Fernando Collor de Mello after a series of scandals involving public funds.
Elections
Lula took part in his first election in 1982, for the government of the state of São Paulo. He lost, but helped his party to gain enough votes to remain in existence.
In the 1986 elections, Lula won a seat in Brazil's Congress with a medium percentage of the votes. The Partido dos Trabalhadores (PT) helped write the country's post-dictatorship constitution, ensuring strong constitutional guarantees for workers' rights, but failing to achieve redistribution of rural agricultural land.
In 1989, still as a Congressman, Lula ran as the PT presidential candidate. Although he was popular with a wide spectrum of Brazilian society, he was feared as an opponent by business owners and financial interests, and was submitted to a thorough vilification by the media, as well as to election-rigging on a local level (sudden absence of busing facilities in places—mostly poor neighbourhoods—where Lula was expected to win, etc.) something which contributed significantly to his losing the election. The fact that his party was formed as a loose confederacy of trade unionists, grassroots activists, left Catholics, left-center social democrats and small Trotskyist groupings, although dampening overtly ideological issues, also earned him the distrust of better-off Brazilians precisely because of the ability of the PT to parade itself as the first working class mass movement organized on a grassroots basis. Conversely, Vargas' Brazilian Labor Party was mostly a top-heavy organization built around the top brass of the State-led trade-union bureaucracy.
Lula refused to run for re-election as a congressman in 1990, busying himself with expanding the Workers' Party organizations around the country. He continued to run for President in 1994 and 1998. As the Brazilian political scene in the 1990s came to be under the sway of the real monetary stabilization plan, which ended decades of rampant inflation, Lula lost in 1994 (in the first round) to the official candidate, former Minister of Finance (and therefore responsible for the real) Fernando Henrique Cardoso, who ran for re-election (after a constitutional amendment ended the long-held rule that a president could not have a second term) in 1998, also having a first-round win.
In the following 2002 campaign, Lula forswore both his informal clothing style and his platform plank of conditioning the payment of Brazil's foreign debt to a prior thorough audit. This last point had worried economists, businessmen and banks, who feared that a Brazilian default (even when partial) along with the already ongoing Argentine default would have a massive ripple effect through the world economy.
Lula became President after winning the second round of the 2002 election, held on October 27, defeating the Center-right candidate Jose Serra of the Partido da Social Democracia Brasileira (Brazilian Social Democracy Party, PSDB)
Lula's government
Political orientation
After winning the presidency, Lula changed many of his original ideals. His party moved progressively to a modern social democratic political position. Instead of deep social changes (as proposed in the past) his government chose a reformist line, passing new retirement, tax, labor, and judicial laws, and discussing a university reform. Some members of the Worker's Party disagreed with these changes in focus.
Significant laws
Here are some significant laws passed by Lula's administration, with his support.
- Social Security Reform of the Civil Service - Passed in 2003, one of the first laws passed by Lula's administration. It aimed to guarantee retirement payments for civil servants for twenty years. In Brazil, civil servants and private sector employees are subject to different retirement and social security legislations. Critics say the law decreased the rights of civil servants; the main argument of critics is that Lula and his party were for years against any initiative about this matter.
- Tax Reform - Partially passed in 2003.
- Judiciary Reform - Partially passed in 2004.
- Bio-security Law - Regulates activities related to the use of genetically modified materials and other related matters, such as embryonic stem cell research;
- University Reform - Being discussed.
- Disarmament Law - A gun control law. Voted by Congress on October 23 2003, it restricted access to firearms to most private citzens, requiring psychological profiling and police screening upon the purchase of personal defence firearms, as well as severely restricting the right to carry one's gun outside one's home. Yet, an additional postscriptum to the law, which proposed a complete banning of retail trade of firearms (masterminded by Luiz Eduardo Greenhalgh, Worker's Party attorney and house representative) was met with rejection by the national electorate when submitted to referendum in 2005. (See Estatuto do Desarmamento (in Portuguese) for further details).
Social projects
As a left-wing president, Lula da Silva made social programs his priority during his campaign and since his election. Lula states that one of the main problems in Brazil today is hunger. In order to tackle this issue, the Lula government devised Fome Zero (Zero Hunger). This program distributes money to selected regions and cities whose inhabitants suffer severe difficulties. Fome Zero has a governmental budget and accepts donations from the public and international community.
There is some criticism about the program's effectiveness and need. According to research conducted by IBGE in 2004, 38.8 million Brazilians are overweight (about 40% of the adult population) and nearly 10 million are obese, with only 3.8 million people being undernourished. This study gave critics ammunition with which they could call overeating a greater health problem than malnourishment in Brazil [1]. According to FAO, however, Brazil has 15.6 million malnourished people—a "plague on both houses" situation very common in medium income countries like Brazil. Another social program is "Bolsa Família" (Family Dole), which unifies many other previously existing government dole schemes. Its objective is to fight poverty and hunger and it consists primarily of financial aid to families with monthly incomes less than R$100.00 (around US$40 as of 2006). It demands that the families send their children to school and keep their mandatory personal vaccination-booklets duly updated.
Economy
As Lula gained strength in the run-up to the 2002 elections, the fear of drastic measures (and comparisons with Hugo Chávez of Venezuela) increased internal market speculation. This led to low demand for sovereign bonds, a rise in the inflation rate, speculative attacks on the Real, and a rise in the sovereign risk factor attributed by Moody's to Brazil's bonds to more than 2000 base points. After his election, the market anxiously awaited the nominations of his cabinet.
The single most important member of Brazil's economic cabinet is the Minister of Finance (Ministro da Fazenda, in Portuguese), who is largely responsible for all fiscal decisions. Unlike other countries, Brazil does not have an independent central bank, leaving to the finance minister to decide the degree of autonomy accorded to the bank. This created a finance minister who was responsible for not only fiscal policy, but could influence monetary policy as well.
The minister chosen by Lula was Antônio Palocci, a physician and former trotskyst activist who had recanted his Extreme Left views while serving as the mayor of the sugarcane processing industry center of Ribeirão Preto, in the State of São Paulo. Palocci had raised himself as one of the key figures in Lula's team of advisers for his election campaign. Although Palocci had Lula's personal backing, his absence of prior upbringing in Economics and his lack of relief as a national political figure didn't give him enough of the political clout necessary in order to win the confidence of the international finance markets in the soundness of his future policies.
Lula, therefore, also chose Henrique Meirelles, a prominent market-oriented economist, for President of the Brazilian Central Bank, the Brazilian monetary authority. Meirelles was eventually approved by the Brazilian Senate. Well known to the market, both at home and internationally, Meirelles had previously been a CEO at BankBoston. Meirelles had been elected to the Chamber of Deputies in 2002 as a member of the PSDB (opposition to President Lula's party), but had to resign that position before becoming President of the Central Bank.
Lula and his cabinet followed in part the ideals of the previous government, by renewing all agreements with the International Monetary Fund (IMF), which were signed by the time Argentina defaulted on its own deals in 2001. His government achieved a satisfactory primary budget surplus in the first 2 years, as required by the IMF agreement, exceeding the target for the third year. In late 2005, the government paid off its debt to the IMF in full, two years ahead of schedule.[2]
Lula invested in international commerce to jump-start the Brazilian economy. He has signed political and economic treaties with countries like Russia, China and South Africa.
Three years after the election, Palocci had slowly but firmly gained the market's confidence, and sovereign risk indexes fell to around 250 points. The government's choice of inflation targeting kept the economy stable, and was complimented during the World Economic Forum of Davos in 2005. However, since 2003 to that point Brazil had dropped 11 positions on the Forum's Growth Competitiveness Index ranking[3][4], something which is often attributed to the high interest rates which stemmed from the inflation-targeting system.
The Brazilian economy was generally not affected by the Mensalão scandal. In early 2006, however, Palocci had to resign as finance minister due to his involvement in an abuse of power scandal which stemmed from the Mensalão Scandal. Lula's following (and current) finance minister was Guido Mantega, a member of Lula's party (PT) and an economist by profession. Mantega, a former marxist who had written a Ph. D thesis (in Sociology) on the history of economic ideas in Brazil from a Left viewpoint, is presently known for his criticisms of high interest rates, which satisfied business interests, while making the finance market aprehensive.
Foreign policy
According to the periodical The Economist (March 2nd 2006), Lula has a pragmatic foreign policy, seeing himself as a negotiator, not an ideologue. As a result, he has befriended both Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez and the American President George Bush. Leading a large and competitive agricultural nation, Lula generally opposes and criticizes farm subsidies, and this position has been seen as one of the reasons for the walkout of developing nations and subsequent collapse of the Cancun World Trade Organization talks in 2003 over G-8 agricultural subsidies. Brazil assumed an important role in international politics and is becoming a regional leader in a fertile dialogue between South America and developed countries, especially the U.S. It played an important role in negotiations in internal conflicts of Venezuela and Colombia, and concentrated efforts on strengthening MERCOSUL/MERCOSUR.
During the Lula administration, Brazilian foreign trade has increased dramatically, changing from deficits to several surpluses since 2003. In 2004 the surplus reached US$ 29 billion due to a substantial increase in global demand for commodities (especially from China). A record surplus is expected in 2005, despite the relatively high value of the Real (the local currency) against the US dollar.
Lula's also supports the implementation of the Tobin tax on international financial transactions to aid developing nations. Brazil has also sent troops and leads a peace keeping mission in Haiti to show its resolve as a global player and to help its bid for a permanent seat on the United Nations Security Council.
Corruption scandal
A burgeoning corruption scandal in mid-2005 threatened Lula's government. After Brazilian Labour Party (PTB) leader Roberto Jefferson was implicated in a bribery case, he accused the Worker's Party in June of paying members of congress illegal monthly stipends to vote for government-backed legislation. In August, campaign manager Duda Mendonça admitted that he had used illegal money to finance Lula's electoral victory of 2002. In November 2005, Lula's former chief of staff was expelled from Congress due to his involvement with the scandal. In April, 2006, Lula's finance minister Antonio Palocci resigned from his post due to his actions during the scandal's investigation. In the same month congress released the conclusion of its investigation on the scandal. The report confirms the existence of the bribery scheme and includes a list with 123 names of involved persons, including politicians, their aides, bankers, businessmen, entrepreneurs and State companies directors. President Lula is only briefly mentioned, with the only evidence of his knowledge of the scheme being Congressman Roberto Jefferson's testimony of having informed the president.[5]
Plans for Re-election
On June 24, 2006, there was an official announcement that Lula will run for a second term as president, having José Alencar once more as his vice-president if reelected. Recent opinion polls show that despite the corruption scandal that stormed his cabinet and forced most of its key members to resign their posts, and the recent vandal onslaught against the Congress building carried out by an organisation affiliated with Lula's party and led by a personal friend of his [6] [7] he is still the favorite for the general elections in October 2006. His direct adversary is PSDB's former governor of São Paulo state, Geraldo Alckmin.
See also
External links
Economy
- Guido Mantega, Ministro da Fazenda
- Henrique Meirelles, President of Banco Central do Brasil
- About the autonomy of the Banco Central do Brasil
Lula's election and foreign policy
- Lula's foreign policy of Third World unity, The Nation
- Brazil's 'Lula' Celebrates Election as President, Voice of America News
- Financial markets hold for Lula, BBC News
- Peace, love and power, Radio Netherlands
- Brazil's Lost Leader From the Council on Hemispheric Affairs
