Brazil & Southern Cone - November 2010 (ISSN 1741-4431)
Dilma takes Lula's crown
On 31 October, Dilma Rousseff, 62, of the ruling left-wing Partido dos Trabalhadores (PT), was elected Brazil's first female president with a resounding 56% of the second round run-off vote, compared to 44% for her rival José Serra of the opposition Partido da Social Democracia Brasileira (PSDB). Her election signals close policy continuity with the immensely popular outgoing administration led by President Lula da Silva, which has been in power since January 2003. 'Dilma', as she's locally known, becomes the 12th female president in Latin America & the Caribbean and joins three incumbents in the region - Argentina's Cristina Fernández de Kirchner (elected in 2007), Costa Rica's Laura Chinchilla (2010) and Trinidad & Tobago's Kamla Persad-Bissessar (2010). Globally, she joins a small club of just 17 female leaders.
Rousseff took 55.7m votes, 12m more than Serra's 43.7m, giving her a decisive democratic mandate. She will take office on 1 January 2011 with an unprecedented majority for the ruling PT-led 10-party coalition in both houses of the federal parliament; and will have the support of 16 of the 27 state governors (inclusive of the federal district). This may not be entirely healthy for democracy, but it puts her in a unique position - her mentor President Lula never had such power.
Lula, who handpicked 'Dilma' as his preferred successor and campaigned intensively on her behalf for well over a year, has promised that his protégé will look after Brazil “like a mother". While Rousseff ran a rather gender neutral campaign, focused on promises of continuity with Lula's economic and social achievements (which were to the particular benefit of low income women), in her victory speech she proudly celebrated her achievement. Borrowing from the US President Barack Obama, she declared, “fathers and mothers all over Brazil can now say to their daughters, 'Yes, women can!'". She promised to honour Brazilian women by transforming her achievement into “a normal event". Education reform and the elimination of 'misery' (or extreme poverty) in Brazil by 2015 is her priority.
After a particularly nasty run-off campaign, Rousseff's first speech ticked all the right boxes. On paper it read well, though the delivery was fairly pedestrian. Nonetheless, Dilma was suitably tearful, gracious, magnanimous towards the opposition and promised to govern for all Brazilians. Directly addressing opposition concerns about her stance on issues like abortion and regulation of the media (her ambigious stance on abortion partially cost her an expected first round victory), she specifically promised to respect press and religious freedom and to govern with full respect for the 1985 constitution. (Of course, left unsaid was the fact that she will have a sufficient majority to amend the constitution if she wants.)
She also gave a nod to the markets, which are concerned about her statist bent and worry that this will be accompanied by fiscal profligacy. Brazil's US$1.6trn economy will soon outweigh the G-8's Italy and like Lula, Rousseff, a trained economist (under the 'developmentalist' Luciano Coutinho, now head of Brazil's national development bank, Bndes), believes in proactively leveraging the weighty federal government and its powerful state agencies and companies to propel faster growth and steer the country towards developed economy status. However, Rousseff is no Hugo Chávez (the radical and heavily interventionsist left-wing socialist president of Venezuela); she took care to praise the role of the country's entrepreneurial private sector in the record job creation of the past eight years, promised to improve the country's onerous bureaucracy (known as the 'custo brasil'), and stressed the need for more efficient and transparent public spending, hinting that she may tighten up the purse strings next year.
She also, however, gave notice that the Lula government's flagship social programs would not be touched and signalled that she is not happy with the heady appreciation of the Real, partially blaming international speculators. The markets will thus be very keen that she follows this initial statement up with the appointment of respected moderates to the finance ministry, the central bank and other key posts like the planning ministry.
For Rousseff, the easy work is already done and there are more doubts than certainties about her ability to govern Brazil. With the conservative press happily talking her down as a “parenthesis" and some in the PT already talking up Lula's 'return' in 2014, she now needs to move quickly and decisively to impose her authority, not only over the PT but also over the main coalition partner, the Partido do Movimento Democrático Brasileiro (PMDB), which provided Rousseff's running mate Michel Temer, a veteran and powerful political baron, and which is angling for key inner circle posts in the new government.
Regional reaction
Brazil's immediate regional neighbours
in the Southern Cone Common Market (Mercosur) likely breathed a sigh of
relief at the election result. Lula has been a major champion of
regional integration and Dilma has echoed this, promising continuity on the
external front. Serra, in contrast, is a Mercosur sceptic and managed to
ruffle feathers with his dispararing comments about the regional group. He more
than ruffled feathers in Bolivia with his controversial statement accusing the
La Paz government led by President Evo Morales of actively turning a blind eye
to increased drugs trafficking from Bolivia into Brazil. Venezuela's President
Hugo Chávez , who openly supported Dilma's bid, was typically effusive in his
congratulations (Serra was vehemently opposed to the pending Venezuelan
membership of Mercosur). Lula (with the tacit support of the US) was well
able to 'manage' Chávez ; it remains to be seen if Dilma will be a similar
moderating force. Equally, Lula had established a positive working relationship
with the ruling Kirchners in Argentina. Dilma will now have to establish a
new rapport with the widowed President Cristina Fernández de Kirchner, whose
immediate priority will the domestic campaign for her re-election in 2011.
Much of Lula's foreign policy efforts, in the region and further afield, depended on his personal charm and charisma. He has hinted at a roving global statesman role come 2011 - at one point the World Bank presidency was mooted - an obvious vacancy would be the post of secretary general of the Union of South American Nations (Unasur) - now empty following the death of Nestór Kirchner. He has also suggested that he would like to work in Africa, which might set him up for a future role in the United Nations (UN). Much will depend on Dilma's performance, the assumption is that he could step back in in 2014 if she doesn't look re-electable.
Dilma's doesn't appear as ambitious as Lula in foreign policy terms, her aims more pragmatic. For instance, she will travel with Lula to the G-20 summit in Seoul on 10-12 November where she intends to raise the global currency war. She led the Brazilian delegation at the Climate Change Summit in Copenhagen last December, where she put forward ambitious 2020 deforestation targets for Brazil. She will also support the difficult talks with the European Union on a free trade deal with Mercosur. Brazil also has a temporary seat on the UN security council at the moment, giving it an important voice on delicate global issues like the Iranian nuclear programme. Unlike Lula, however, Dilma is unlikely to turn up in Tehran any time soon.
- Voter turnout