The year began with a new government, with the inauguration of Lula and Alckmin and, a week later, also with an attempted Bolsonaro coup, supported by the military. The attempt was frustrated. But it is a demonstration of the danger that the extreme right represents, especially when we know that, in the future, it will be able to try new things like this, since some have a dictatorship project.
By: PSTU Brazil
Unfortunately, while the streets and the people demand that the coup leaders be punished “Without Amnesty” and, contrary to what the situation demands, the orientation of the Lula government involves negotiations with the leadership of the Armed Forces and with the big shots. of Bolsonarism. He even supported Arthur Lira, the one with the secret budget and protector of Bolsonaro, as president of the Chamber.
It was already absurd before, but after January 8 it is even worse to keep Múcio as Defense Minister. He came to praise the demonstrations in front of the barracks. It is also inadmissible to leave the Armed Forces intact. Both the dome and its formation.
Meanwhile, a meeting was held, including a dinner in Brasilia, which brought together everyone from the PSOL, from Boulos, to Eduardo Bolsonaro, passing through the entire Centrão and the PT. What was discussed in this heterogeneous and suspicious meeting? It is hard to believe that it is something of interest to workers.
Contrary to what the press or even the PT says, talking and building agreements with the right are not effective efforts in defense of democracy. On the contrary, passing cloth to the coup plotters only helps the coup plotters themselves. Making deals with billionaires and their representatives only makes them richer.
The only thing we can verify, with certainty, is that, despite there being people who defend the military dictatorship and others who defend this democracy of the rich, they all agree to defend capitalism and the interests of big business.
Capitalist exploitation and destruction run loose
Meanwhile, the people continue to suffer with low wages and even the measly 18 reales [de aumento] They are threatened in the minimum wage. Public services are about to disappear. While big deals are being sewn with the rich and powerful in Brasilia, illegal mining continues to devastate the Amazon and indigenous peoples, generating a situation of genocide and calamity among the Yanomami.
The perverse effects of capitalism in the destruction of the environment were promoted by Bolsonaro, but this dates back a long time and involves several governments.
Given the catastrophe that were the Bolsonaro years, it is not surprising that there is a certain expectation of the workers and the people at the beginning of 2023. Lula knows this and, when he took office, he went up the ramp [de la Casa de Gobierno] with various sectors of the Brazilian people, representing the exploited and oppressed of this country. The problem is that this contradicts the very composition and policies of the government.
There are ministries with people like Daniela Carneiro (of Tourism), linked to the right and to the militias [de ultraderecha], In janeiro river. In addition to representatives of businessmen in ministries linked to the economy, such as Alckimin and Tebet. Even Haddad has already announced what he promises to be a new tax ceiling policy, to calm the capitalists, and a Tax Reform proposal, to also please the bosses.
Workers have to be vigilant. It is necessary to repudiate any threat of a coup. But neither is it possible to support this new Lula government. The alliances and policies that are implemented, despite the expectations of the workers, are in line with everything defended by Biden and the imperialist countries, which are the main bulwarks of this world capitalism.
The government has even been playing the game of the imperialist countries by supporting the repression of the Boluarte government in Peru, allowing the shipment of arms there against popular demonstrations.
We need organization, independence, struggles and a socialist project
At the same time, the government summoned the trade union centrals and the social movements for meetings. But, far from presenting any measures to attack the profits of the capitalists or address the demands of the workers, in fact, he only wants the movements to support the government.
The workers must be independent of the government and build a left-wing opposition, different from Bolsonarism. In order to confront the system and also the extreme right, the workers need to rely on their own strength. It is not possible that they are prisoners of the capitalists and the Lula-Alckmin government or of broad alliances with the billionaires and the right wing itself.
In this coming year, the workers, to guarantee their needs, need to fight, demanding their demands from the government. But not only that. Faced with the permanent refusal of governments, over the years, to serve the people and, on the contrary, guarantee the profits of the rich, it is evident that our struggle clashes with the capitalist system itself.
They always invent a thousand excuses for everything to continue as it is. They say that raising the minimum wage to that calculated by DIEESE (around 6,000 reais) would bankrupt the country. But when billionaires bankrupt a company like the Americans, for their scams to suck millions in wealth, now threatening to lay off 40,000 workers, it is the State and non-payment to the banks that these gentlemen turn to to continue Earning money.
We need to fight for our claims and also understand that this system needs to be changed. For this, each struggle must be at the service of a country project built by the workers, which does not even happen through the PT government, much less through Bolsonaro and the ultra-right.
Fighting, debating, improving their organization and increasing their awareness, the workers can do anything. This materializes in the construction of a socialist program and in the strengthening of a revolutionary party; thus effectively building a socialist and revolutionary alternative for the country, which overcomes this polarization between the bourgeois sectors that the country is going through.
Editorial article published in www.pstu.org.br, 2/2/2023.-
Translation: Natalia Estrada.