Local lefties silent as Brazil’s ‘economic miracle’ falls apart

GIVEN the fact that Brazil had recently emerged as the ideological lodestar of the left, it’s surprising that its economic implosion seems to have received scant attention from its admirers in South Africa.

The impeachment last week of president Dilma Rousseff by the senate for budgetary malfeasance is not only the culmination of the spectacular fall of a political figure, it has also sullied an economic miracle that had attracted eager disciples and copycats from around the world.

Brazil’s emergence as an economic powerhouse under a leftist leader had offered a welcome ideological counterweight to the so-called Washington consensus of free trade, fiscal discipline and privatisation so intensely despised by the left.

Cosatu, especially, used Brazil’s example to argue for more radical economic policies.

For South Africans, wearied sick by their president’s shenanigans, Rousseff’s misdemeanours are small beer. While one may quibble with the agendas involved in her removal, there is, however, no denying that Brazil, unlike South Africa, has a democratic system that is able to hold its leaders to account. Her predecessor, former president Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva — seen as a towering figure and architect of Brazil’s economic resurgence not so long ago — is awaiting trial for money laundering and tax evasion.

Brazil has just hosted a successful Olympic Games. The Paralympic Games are now in progress there. Two years ago, the world descended on it for the soccer World Cup.

The country was in good economic health when the bids to host these events were made. It has now fallen on hard times. The economy has been in recession for more than two years. Meant to celebrate Brazil’s emergence as a serious player on the world stage, the sports showpieces only helped to expose the country’s soft underbelly. The world came to be entertained, but the social inequalities that still dog Brazil were also laid bare for all to see. It turned out the much-vaunted economic progress of the past few years had only papered over the cracks.

The country’s elite responded with apprehension when Lula, a former trade union leader, led his Workers’ Party to power in January 2003. At the time Brazil enjoyed the tag “world’s most unequal society”.

The Workers’ Party was expected to introduce radical economic policies. But Lula surprised the rich. He sought to work with them. The economy took off. It grew at more than 7% even after the financial crisis. And it was the rich, not the poor, who prospered in Lula’s first term. He made up for it in his second term. He raised the minimum wage by more than 50% and put more money into social grants. Even the poor had money in their pockets.

Lula, a workerist running a successful economy, was an unusual, fascinating spectacle. His star rose, along with that of Brazil. Getting the rights to host both the Olympic Games and the World Cup was confirmation that the country had joined the big league. It also became a founding member of Brics, further enhancing its international stature.

Here at home, the so-called “Lula moment” or Lulism became the rage among those on the left engaged in ding-dong battles on economic policy inside the tripartite alliance. At last lefties had an economic model they could be proud of.

“Look at Brazil” or “What about Brazil?” was the rejoinder to questions about socialist shibboleths in a post-Cold War political climate. It was wielded against what were seen as the neoliberal economic policies pursued by the ANC government under Thabo Mbeki.

Remember those interminable battles over inflation targeting and the surplus that had to be squandered? All that fed into the narrative that ultimately led to Mbeki’s defeat by Jacob Zuma at Polokwane nine years ago.

What made the debate even more pertinent to us was the fact that Lula’s policies had rescued millions from poverty. Brazil had thus ceased to be the world’s most unequal society, handing that unwanted moniker to South Africa.

The belief was that a little Lulism could also do the trick here.

According to his friends, Zuma, like Lula before him, did little in his first term to help the poor. In the run-up to the ANC conference in Mangaung in 2012 that was to grant Zuma a second term, Cosatu — its relations with Zuma already souring — invited Lula, who had retired by then, to address its central committee.

Said Cosatu spokesman Patrick Craven: “We hope that the message from Brazil will reach the ANC delegates as they debate at the party’s conference. It’s not just about getting the president elected for the second term, but a change of mindset and pro-poor policies.”

There’s no evidence that Zuma got the message. Instead, he stood up to announce that the National Development Plan — a red rag to the left — had become ANC policy, before delegates even had a chance to debate it.

For the left, therefore, the Lula moment was nothing but a mirage, a time-wasting illusion.

The belief was that a little Lulism could also do the trick here