From Rio de Janeiro
Lula will go up the ramp of the Planalto Palace for the third time on January 1st. The first time he did it exactly twenty years ago. He left the presidency of Brazil con 87% supporteven with the vast majority of media against him.
Since then, Lula has been president of Brazil for eight years, he has lived through six years of the government of the Dilma Rousseffhe was 540 days in prison. It was, therefore, the central character of Brazilian political history.
In fact, his life itself is confused with the history of Brazil for more than seventy years. First, being born in the poorest region of the country – the North East-. Immediately following the journey of millions of other people like his family, traveling in the transport called “pau de arara” to the south of Brazil, as northeastern immigrant. His very last name – Silva – is the most popular and characteristic of poor families.
In Saint Paul was shoeshine boy, cadet, among many other activities of the children of his generation. Until, chosen by his mother to be the child of the family that he would study, he took the course of mechanical worker.
His life trajectory was part of the process of industrialization of the fifties, promoted by San Pablo as the most important province in the country. Just as it was part of the urbanization process, which has radically transformed Brazil in the 50s, 60s and 70s.
Lula was part of the new working class of Brazil, which has transformed the class structure of the country. He was the protagonist of the formation of the new brazilian left, with the formation of the PT, the CUT, the MST, among other organizations. He was the main union leader in the resistance andagainst the military dictatorship, leading the strikes more importantfrom the countryfundamental to weaken and lead to the fall of the dictatorship.
Until, after being a candidate three times for the presidency of Brazil, he was elected president in 2002. On January 1 of the following year, he climbed the ramp of the Planalto Palace for the first time.
He has become the best and most popular Brazilian political leader and the best known brazilian in the world, after Pele. He was elected and re-elected president, he chose his successor in office. As president, he has promoted improving the living conditions of the mass of the working class of Brazil, particularly the workers from the Northeast, which he had abandoned due to the miserable living conditions of the Northeastern population.
The drought, the lack of water in the entire region, one of the reasons for the misery and immigration of millions of people like him, was only overcome when Lula, as president of Brazil, promoted the transfer of the San Francisco River, bringing water to the entire region. As it is said, he left the northeast due to the lack of water and returned carrying water to all the northeast.
But, among all the so important phenomena that Lula has lived through and starred in, the most outstanding has been his presidency of Brazil. From the Planalto Palace, he has led the most important government since Getulio Vargas. In truth, his government has been the most important moment, so far, in Brazilian history.
His life itself is confused with the history of Brazil itself. What poor son of the northeast from the country. What southbound immigrant from Brazil. As worker and trade unionist. As the most important leftist leader in the country. As the most prominent president. As a political prisoner. As president of Brazil, again, three years later to get out of prison having proven his innocence.
Lula reoccupies the presidency through the democratic path of the popular vote. He returns to that position with the country in the worst conditions he has ever experienced.
He experienced the worst conditions of misery that Brazil has ever known. He was a union leader to fight against that misery. He promoted economic growth, which had in the northeast the region that has developed the most in his government.
Lula has the possibility of recovering lThe critical situation in Brazil, which inherits for the second time. He will leave the government 24 years after the start of his first government, at the age of 81.