http://lo-de-alla.org/2013/06/brazil-meaning-and-perspectives-of-the-demonstrations/#more-4172
Brazil: Meaning and perspectives of the demonstrations<http://lo-de-alla.org/2013/06/brazil-meaning-and-perspectives-of-the-demonstrations/> *[image: robert lobato x]<http://lo-de-alla.org/wp-content/uploads/2013/06/robert-lobato-x.jpg>An interviw with João Pedro Stedile of the Landless Workers Movement* [Translation of an interview from *Brasil de Fato* of São Paulo for June 25, 2013. See original here <http://www.brasildefato.com.br/node/13339>.] by Nilton Viana Its time for the government to join the people or it will pay the price in the future. That is one of the assessments of João Pedro Stedile of the national leadership of the Movimento dos Trabalhadores Rurais Sem Terra (MST Landless Workers Movement) concerning the recent demonstrations throughout the country. He believes there is an urban crisis in Brazilian cities brought on by the present stage of finance capitalism. People are living in hell in the large cities, spending three, four hours a day traveling, when they could be with their families, studying or taking part in cultural activities, he declares. The MST leader believes the reduction of fares mattered greatly to all the people and that this was a correct position on the part of the Movimento Passe Livre (Free Fare Movement), which was able to call demonstrations in the name of the peoples interests. In this exclusive interview with *Brasil de Fato,* Stedile talks about the character of these mobilizations and makes an appeal: we should be conscious of the nature of the demonstrations and all take to the streets to contend for hearts and minds in order to politicize these youth, who have no experience with the class struggle. The young are fed up with this kind of bourgeois, mercantile politics, he holds. And he warns: the most serious part is that the parties of the institutional Left, all of them, have adopted these methods. They have grown old and bureaucratic. The popular forces and the parties of the Left need to direct all their energy toward taking to the streets, since what is happening in every city, in every demonstration, is an ideological dispute in the struggle over class interests. We need to explain to the people who their principal enemies are. _______________________________________ *Brasil de Fato How do you analyze the recent demonstrations that have shaken Brazil over the past few weeks? On what economic basis are they occurring?* *João Pedro Stedile* There are many explanations for why these demonstrations are occurring. I agree with the analysis by Professor Erminia Maricato, who is our greatest specialist in urban affairs and has been in the Ministry of Cities under Olivio Dutra [during the Lula da Silva administration]. She supports the thesis that there is an urban crisis developing in Brazilian cities brought about by this present stage of finance capitalism. There has been enormous real estate speculation in the past three years that has raised the prices of rentals and land by 150%. With no government oversight, the capitalists financed the sale of automobiles, sending the money out of the country, and turning our transportation into chaos. And in the last ten years there has been no investment in public transportation. The *Minha Casa, Minha Vida* housing program [My House, My Life, which provided federally subsidized housing loans to the middle class] forced the poor to the outskirts, where there was no infrastructure. All this created a structural crisis, in which people are living a hell in the large cities, spending three, four hours a day traveling, when they could be with their families, studying or engaging in cultural activities. Added to this is the very bad quality of public services, especially in healthcare and even in education, from primary school to high school, in which the students come out without knowing how to write a composition. And higher education has turned into a shop selling diplomas on credit, thats where 70% of university students are. *From the political point of view, why is this happening?* The 15 years of neoliberalism plus the last ten years of a government based on classes changed the way of doing politics into a hostage of the interests of capitalism. The parties grew old in their practices and became mere symbols that brought together, most of them, opportunists to climb up to public offices or to compete for public resources in their own interests. None of the youth born after *Diretas Já* [Rights Now, civil unrest in 1984 to demand direct election of presidents to replace the congressional electoral college, which had installed the military regime] had the opportunity to participate in politics. These days, to run for any position, for councilor, for example, a person needs more than a million * reais.* For a member of congress, it costs around ten million *reais.*The capitalists pay and then the politicians obey them. The young have had enough of this bourgeois, mercantile way of doing politics. But the worst part is that the parties of the institutional Left, all of them, have adopted these methods. They grew old and bureaucratic. And so this created in the youth a mistrust of the way the parties behave. And they are right. The youth are not apolitical; on the contrary, they are so political that they took politics to the street, without even being conscious of their significance. But they are saying they will not put up with watching on television these political practices that highjack peoples votes, on the basis of lies and manipulation. And the parties of the Left need to relearn that their role is to organize the social struggle and to politicize the working class. Otherwise, they will fall into the mass grave of history. *[image: Brazil Confed Cup Protests]<http://lo-de-alla.org/wp-content/uploads/2013/06/nelson-antoine-ap-x.jpg>And why have the demonstrations started at this particular time?* It was probably more because of the sum of diverse factors of a mass psychological nature than some planned political decision. This, added to the climate I talked about, plus denunciation of excessive spending on the stadiums, which is clearly an affront to the people. Consider some episodes. The Rede Globo [the dominant television network of the country] received from the government of the state of Rio de Janeiro and from the local government 20 million *reais* of public funds to put on a show, only two hours long, about the Copa das Confederações [soccer] games. The Brasilia stadium cost 1.4 billion *reais,* and the city doesnt even have buses! The open dictatorship and the dirty tricks that FIFA/CBF [the International Footbal Association and the Brazilian Football Confederation] pulled and that the governments submitted to. The re-inauguration of the Maracanã [soccer stadium in Rio de Janeiro] was a slap in the face for the Brazilian people. The photos were clear: in the largest soccer temple in the world there was not a single Black or mestizo face! And then the increase in bus fares was just the spark to ignite the general feeling of revolt, the indignation. The fuel for the spark came from the *tucano* [Social Democracy Party] government of Geraldo Alckman, which, protected by the São Paulo media that it finances, and accustomed to attacking the people with impunity, as it did in the *Pinheirinho* [violent eviction of squatters in January, 2012] and in other rural and urban evictions, used its police to commit barbaric acts. At that point everyone reacted. Just as well that the youth agreed. And there was the good sense of the Movimento Passe Livre, which managed to capitalize on that popular dissatisfaction and to organize protests at the right time. *Why hasnt the working class taken to the streets yet?* Its true, the working class has not yet taken to the streets. Those in the streets are the children of the middle class, the lower middle class, and also some youths from what Andre Singer would call the sub-proletariat, who study and work in the service industries, who improve their conditions as consumers but who want to be heard. The latter appeared more in other capitals and in the outskirts. The lowering of fares mattered a lot to all the people and that was the right move for the Movimento Passe Livre; it managed to call demonstrations in the name of the interests of the people. And the people supported the demonstrations. That is clear in the levels of popularity of the youths, especially when they were repressed. The working class puts off moving but when they do move they affect capital directly. Something that has not yet begun to happen. I think that the organizations that mediate with the working class have not understood the moment and they are a little timid. But the class, as a class, I think that it is ready to struggle as well. Notice that the number of strikes for better pay has already returned to the levels of the 1980s. I think that it is just a matter of time and of the mediators finding the right demands to motivate the class. In the past few days we can see that in some smaller cities and on the outskirts of the large cities demonstrations are already beginning to take place with very local demands. And that is very important. *You in the MST and the campesinos are not on the move yet either.* That is true. In the capitals where we have nearby settlements and family farmers we are already participating. I am a witness to the fact that we have been very well received, with our red flag and with our demands for agrarian reform, healthy and inexpensive food for all the people. I think that within the next few weeks there could be a greater participation, including holding campesino demonstrations on the highways and cities in the interior. Among our activists everyone is aching to get into the fight and to mobilize. I expect they will move soon. *In your opinion, what is the source of the violence that has occurred in some demonstrations?* First lets put things in perspective. The bourgeoisie, by means of its television, has used the tactic of frightening the people by showing only propaganda about the vandals and the rioters. They are the minority and insignificant compared with the thousands of people who mobilized. For the right, it is important to instill in the peoples imagination that this is just a mess and if in the end there is chaos, to place the blame on the government and demand the presence of the armed forces. I hope the government does not commit the stupidity of calling in the national guard and the armed forces to put down the demonstrations. Thats all the right could hope for! What is provoking the scenes of violence is the way the Policia Militar is intervening. The PM has been prepared since the military dictatorship to always deal with the people as the enemy. And in the states governed by the *tucanos* (São Paulo, Rio de Janeiro and Minas Gerais), there is still the promise of impunity. There are rightist groups organized to carry out provocation and looting. In São Paulo, fascist groups and contracted strongarms have acted. In Rio de Janeiro, organized militia, who protect their conservative politicians, have taken part. Of course, there is also a substratum of lumpen elements who show up at any popular gathering, whether in the stadiums, at carnaval, even at church festivities, trying to take advantage. *So is there a class struggle in the streets or is it just the young demonstrating their anger?* It is clear that there is a class struggle in the streets, although not yet centered on ideological debate. And what is more serious, the mobilized youth themselves, because of their class origins, are not conscious of participating in an ideological struggle. They are doing politics in the best way possible, in the streets. And there they write on their posters: we are against the parties and politics. That is why the messages on the posters are so diffuse. It is happening, in every city, in every demonstration, an ideological debate on the struggle over class interests. The youth are being fought over by the ideas of the right and of the left. By the capitalists and by the working class. On the other hand, well articulated signs of the right and their intelligence services are evident; using the internet, they hide behind masks and manage to create waves of rumors and opinions through the internet. Suddenly, a strange message spreads to thousands of messages. And from there as a result it spreads as though it were an expression of the majority. These mechanisms of manipulation were used by the CIA and by the United States Department of State, in the Arab Spring, in the attempt at destabilization of Venezuela, in the Syrian war. It is clear that they are operating here as well to reach their objectives. *And what are the objectives and the proposals of the right?* The dominant class, the capitalists, the interest of the United States empire and its ideological spokesmen, who appear on television every day, has one grand objective: to wear out the Dilma administration, to weaken the working class organizations, to defeat any proposals for structural change in Brazilian society and to win the 2014 elections, to rebuild a total hegemony in command of the Brazilian state, which is now in dispute. To attain those objectives, they are still exploring, alternating their tactics. Sometimes they provoke violence to blur the objectives of the young. Sometimes, they get their messages onto the young peoples posters. For example, the demonstration in São Paulo on Saturday, the 22nd, although small, was completely manipulated by rightist sectors who mentioned only the struggle against PEC 37 [a measure to limit the ability to investigate government officials, rejected after protests], with strangely similar posters and the same word order. Of course most of the youth do not even know what it is about. And it is a question that is secondary for the people, but the right is trying to raise the banners of morality, as the UDN [a right-wing party no longer in existence] did in the past. What they are doing in congress will by and by reach the streets. I have seen on the social media controlled by the Right, that its demands, besides the PEC 37, are: Renan out of the senate; CPI and transparency in spending for the Copa. The most fascist groups have already tried Dilma Out and we the undersigned for impeachment. Happily, these demands have nothing to do with the living conditions of the masses, though they can be manipulated by the media. And, objectively, they could be shooting themselves in the foot. In the end, it is the Brazilian bourgeoisie, its businessmen and politicians who are the majority of the corrupt and the corrupting. Who took charge of excess spending for the Copa? The Rede Globo and the entrepreneurs! *In this scenario, what are the challenges facing the working class and the popular organizations and parties of the Left?* There are many challenges. First we should be conscious of the nature of these demonstrations and all go to the streets to try to win hearts and minds, to politicize the young who have no experience of class struggle. Second, the working class needs to be on the move, to take to the streets, to demonstrate in the factories, the fields and the construction sites, as Geraldo Vandré would say. To raise our demands to solve the concrete problems of the class, from the economic and political points of view. Third, we need to explain to the people who the peoples principal enemies are. And now they are the banks, the transnational corporations who took over our economy, the agribusiness landowners and the speculators. We need to take the initiative of setting the agenda for the debate in the society and to demand approval of the proposal to reduce the work day to 40 hours; to demand that the priority of pubic investments be healthcare, education, agrarian reform. But for that purpose, the government needs to cut interest rates and move the resources from the primary surplus, that 200 billion * reais* that go every year to only 20,000 rich people, rentiers, creditors of an internal debt that we never settle, shift it to productive and social investments. That is what the class struggle asks of the Dilma administration: will public resources go to the rentier bourgeoisie or to solve the peoples problems? Approve an emergency measure to put in force a lasting political reform that, at the least, would institute exclusive public financing of campaigns. The right to revoke mandates and the right of the people to call popular plebiscites. We need a tax reform that once again charges ICMS [a tax on businesses] on primary exports and penalizes the wealth of the rich, and eases the taxes on the poor people, who are the ones who pay the most. We need the government to suspend the auctioning of petroleum and all the privatizing concession of mining and other public areas. It is no use applying all the petroleum royalties to education if the royalties represent only eight percent of the petroleum income and the 92 percent goes to the transnational businesses that are going to keep the petroleum from the auctions! A structural urban reform that once again prioritizes public transportation, of good quality and with no fares. It has already been proven that it is not expensive or difficult to institute free transportation for the masses in the capitals. And to control speculation in real estate. And, finally, we need to take advantage of and approve the project of the broadly representative Conferência Nacional de Comunicação to democratize the communications media. To do away thus with the Globo monopoly, so the people and the popular organizations can have broad access to communicate, to create their own means of communication, with public resources. I heard from several youth movements that make up the marches that perhaps that is the only demand that unites them all: down with Globo! But for those demands to have resonance in society and to pressure the government and the politicians, it is essential for the working class to mobilize. *What should the government do now?* I hope the government will have the sensitivity and the intelligence to take advantage of this support, this outcry from the streets, that is nothing but a synthesis of a diffuse consciousness in society that it is time to change. And to change in favor of the people. For this purpose the government needs to confront the dominant class, in all its aspects. Confront the rentier bourgeoisie, shifting the payment of interest on investments to areas that solve the problems of the people. Then promote political and tax reforms. Set in motion the approval of the project to democratize the communications media. Create mechanisms for heavy investment in public transportation, leading to zero fares. Speed up agrarian reform and a plan for production of healthy food for the domestic market. Then guarantee the use of ten percent of the GNP of public resources for education at all levels, from kindergarten in the large cities, quality primary teaching, to the universalization of access to public universities. Without that, there will be disappointment and the government will turn over to the Right the initiative on demands to be raised by the new demonstrations, with the aim of wearing the government down until the 2014 elections. It is time for the government to ally with the people or it will pay the cost in the future. *And what perspectives can these demonstrations bring to the country in the next few months?* It is all still an unknown, because the youth and the masses are in debate. That is why the popular forces and the parties of the left need to shift all their energy to taking to the streets. Demonstrate, shift the demands to reforms that matter to the people. Because the Right is going to do the same thing and shift its conservative, backward demands for the criminalization and stigmatization of ideas for social change. We are in full ideological battle, of which no one knows yet what the result will be. In every city, in every demonstration, we need to win hearts and minds. And those left out will remain outside history. 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