Brazil’s Leftist Ruling Party, Born of Protests, Is Perplexed by Revolt
By SIMON ROMERO
The governing Workers Party is watching with dismay as Brazil’s largest
city braces for a new round of demonstrations on Thursday.
Mauricio Lima for The New York Times
Students rallied Tuesday against higher transit fares in São Paulo.
Mauricio Lima for The New York Times
By SIMON ROMERO
Published: June 20, 2013
SÃO PAULO, Brazil — The protests were heating up on the streets of
Brazil’s largest city last week, but the mayor was not in his office. He
was not even in the city. He had left for Paris to try to land the 2020
World’s Fair — exactly the kind of expensive, international mega-event
that demonstrators nationwide have scorned.
The New York Times
A week later, the mayor, Fernando Haddad, 50, was holed up in his
apartment as scores of protesters rallied outside and others smashed the
windows of his office building, furious that he had refused to meet
with them, much less yield to their demand to revoke a contentious bus
fare increase.
How such a rising star in the leftist governing party, someone whose
name is often mentioned as a future presidential contender, so badly
misread the national mood reflects the disconnect between a growing
segment of the population and a government that prides itself on popular
policies aimed at lifting millions out of poverty.
After rising to prominence on the backs of huge protests to usher in
democratic leadership, the governing Workers Party now finds itself
perplexed by the revolt in its midst, watching with dismay as political
corruption, bad public services and the government’s focus on lifting
Brazil’s international stature through events like the 2014 World Cup
and the 2016 Olympics inspire outrage.
On Wednesday, tens of thousands protested outside the newly built stadium where Brazil faced off against Mexico
in the Confederations Cup, as the police tried to disperse them with
tear gas, rubber bullets and pepper spray. In what would normally be a
moment of unbridled national pride, demonstrators held up placards
demanding schools and hospitals at the “FIFA standard,” challenging the
money Brazil is spending on the World Cup instead of on health care or
the poorly financed public schools.
Now the authorities across Brazil are bracing for a new round of
protests on Thursday, with one newspaper reporting that demonstrations
are expected in more than 80 cities throughout the country — from big
urban centers like São Paulo and Rio de Janeiro to Manaus in the Amazon
and Teresina in the northeast.
“We want the act to be bigger today,” said Tadeu Lemos, 22, a student
leader at the Federal University of Rio de Janeiro, part of an
organizing group that drew up various points to continue protesting,
including having a voice over expenditures for the World Cup and the
Olympics.
Security forces in various cities are preparing for a large turnout. In
the capital, Brasília, police said they would cordon off access to
buildings like the Congress, a structure that protesters were able to
scale one night this week and dance on the roof, providing a shock to
political leaders. And in Rio de Janeiro, banks boarded up windows while
the authorities placed metal barriers in front of the governor’s
palace.
With support for the protests escalating — a new poll by Datafolha found
that 77 percent of São Paulo residents approved of them this week,
compared with 55 percent the week before — Mayor Haddad and Geraldo
Alckmin, the governor of São Paulo State, from an opposition party,
bowed on Wednesday night, announcing that they would cancel the bus and
subway fare increases after all. Other cities, including Rio de Janeiro,
pledged to do the same.
But while the fare increases might have been the spark that incited the
protests, they unleashed a much broader wave of frustration against
politicians from an array of parties that the government has openly
acknowledged it did not see coming.
“It would be a presumption to think that we understand what is
happening,” Gilberto Carvalho, a top aide to President Dilma Rousseff,
told senators on Tuesday. “We need to be aware of the complexity of what
is occurring.”
The swell of anger is a stunning change from the giddy celebrations that
occurred in 2007, when Brazil was chosen by soccer’s governing body to
host the World Cup. At the time, dozens of climbers scaled Rio de
Janeiro’s Sugar Loaf Mountain, from which they hung an enormous jersey
with the words “The 2014 World Cup is Ours.”
“We are a civilized nation, a nation that is going through an excellent
phase, and we have got everything prepared to receive adequately the
honor to organize an excellent World Cup,” Ricardo Teixeira, then the
president of the Brazilian Football Confederation, said at the time.
Multimedia
Related
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The Lede: Brazil’s Protesters, in Their Own Words (June 20, 2013)
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The Lede: Tear Gas Fired Outside Stadium in Brazil, But Protest Still Spreads Inside (June 19, 2013)
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The Lede: Readers Debate Brazil’s Protests (June 19, 2013)
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The Lede: Protests Expand in Brazil, Fueled by Video of Police Brutality (June 18, 2013)
Related in Opinion
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Room for Debate: Will the Protests Change Brazil? (June 19, 2013)
Since then, the sentiment surrounding Brazil’s preparations for the
World Cup, and much else overseen by the government, has shifted. Mr.
Teixeira himself resigned last year, under a cloud of corruption
allegations, and while the Brazilian government says it is spending
about $12 billion on preparing for the World Cup, most of the stadiums
are over budget, according to the government’s own audits court.
The sheen that once clung to the Workers Party has also been tarnished
by a vast vote-buying scheme called the mensalão, or big monthly
allowance, in a nod to the regular payments some lawmakers received. The
scandal resulted in the recent conviction of several of high-ranking
officials, including a party president and a chief of staff for Luiz
Inácio Lula da Silva, who was a popular Brazilian president.
“There’s been a democratic explosion on the streets,” said Marcos Nobre,
a professor at the University of Campinas. “The Workers Party thinks it
represents all of the progressive elements in the country, but they’ve
been power now for a decade. They’ve done a lot, but they’re now the
establishment.”
The economic growth that once propelled Brazil’s global ambitions has
slowed considerably, and inflation, a scourge for decades until the
mid-1990s, has re-emerged as a worry for many Brazilians.
But expectations among Brazilians remain high, thanks in large part to
the government’s own success at diminishing inequality and raising
living standards for millions over the last decade. The number of
university students doubled from 2000 to 2011, according to Marcelo
Ridenti, a prominent sociologist.
“This generates huge changes in society, including changes in
expectations among young people,” he said. “They expect to get not only
jobs, but good jobs.”
Unemployment is still at historical lows — partly because of the very
stadiums and other construction projects that have become the source of
such ire among some protesters. But well-paying jobs remain out of reach
for many college graduates, who see a sharp difference between their
prospects and those of political leaders.
“I think our politicians get too much money,” said Amanda Marques, 23, a
student, referring not to graft but to their salaries.
Earlier this year, Mr. Alckmin, the governor, announced that he was
giving himself and thousands of other public employees a raise of more
than 10 percent; his own salary should climb to about $10,000 a month as
a result. High salaries for certain public employees have long been a
festering source of resentment in Brazil, with some officials earning
well more than counterparts in rich industrialized nations.
Both Mr. Alckmin and Mr. Haddad followed the protests together in Paris
last week on their smartphones. But at the time, Mr. Alckmin dismissed
the protests as the equivalent to a routine strike by air traffic
controllers in Paris, something “that happens.”
“What has to be done is be strong and stand firm to avoid excesses,” he
told reporters then, before the protests had spread on the streets of
São Paulo and dozens of other cities across Brazil.
By this week, it was clear how thoroughly officials had miscalculated.
At one point on Tuesday night, protesters tried to break into the
Municipal Theater, where operagoers were watching Stravinsky’s “Rake’s
Progress.” The doors to the elegant theater remained shut and as the
show went on, they spray-painted the outside of the recently renovated
structure with the words “Set Fire to the Bourgeoisie.”
COPY http://www.nytimes.com
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