Independence or death?

Independence did not occur; the deaths, many in the form of genocide, were not achieved.

September 7th did not free the country from dependence, from the whip, from the stocks, from spoliation; the fifth of the gold, imposed by Portugal, today corresponds to the interest on financial capital, the derrama of that time resembles the illegitimate and unpayable public debt of today, interest and debt that keep the governments of Brazil under siege. 

The similarities between the dictatorship and Bolsonaro's regime are not accidental; they are a product of our history. 

During the dictatorship, the military usurped the September 7th holiday, just as Bolsonaro's supporters have been doing. However, September 7th belongs to history and cannot be stolen by Bolsonaro's fascism.

The letters and manifestos signaled the desire of Brazilian society, both within Brazil and among other nations, including the UN, to express that society no longer wants and will not accept subversion of the Constitution and democracy.  

The achievement of democracy came at the cost of many tragedies for the Brazilian people, and particularly for my generation of '68. 

The people know what a dictatorship is and will not allow its return.

In this article, based on texts by researchers, I note some strong similarities between the military dictatorship and the militarized Bolsonaro government.

Let's start with health: during the dictatorship, the Ministry of Health received 4,29% of the federal budget in 1966; this percentage decreased until it reached 0,99% in 1974. Curiously, during this period there was an outbreak of meningitis, which was also suppressed by the military government, although vaccination did take place.

Under the Bolsonaro administration, in addition to attempts to suppress the pandemic, resources for healthcare were also meager; this year, only 3,19% of the budget went to this area. In 2021, it was only 3,29%, the lowest share of the period, even at the peak of the pandemic in Brazil.

Regarding education, In 1982, during the dictatorship, Brazil appeared as the Latin American country with the lowest percentage of public spending, only 6,5% of GDP. The consequences were the rapid degradation of the quality of education, the stagnation of teachers' salaries, the hiring of teachers with precarious training, and even the lack of basic materials necessary for daily school life. Educational policies were geared towards training a workforce according to market needs and imposing military-style behavior, without critical awareness.

Political and ideological persecution also affected students and professors indiscriminately, even those without party or revolutionary affiliation. Simply being a student or professor in the humanities was enough to suffer discrimination and persecution.

The same thing is happening now; Bolsonarism has led to the belief that the humanities (mainly Philosophy and Sociology) are useless. There was a 30% budget cut for research centers, especially those considered hostile to the government. Cuts were made from early childhood education to university level. The priority was given to political deals, such as those with evangelical pastors, and blatant corruption.

Science and technology were viewed by the military dictatorship as a means of economic advancement for Brazil, but only under ideological control. Job opportunities were closed to those professionals with critical thinking. In this way, Brazil lost technicians and institutions, and the possibility of technological advancement and the preservation of national memory.

During the current Bolsonaro administration, there has been manipulation, both in research to further his own government projects, and in behavior, in accordance with his conservative values. 

Educators have suffered a series of attacks, whether through cuts in funding for research, or ideological attacks on universities and scientific production. They appointed Minister Marcos Pontes, considered by some to be a Brazilian hero for having been at NASA and having gone to space; however, he is a reactionary astronaut, limited both technically and intellectually.

During the dictatorship, there was censorship and persecution of educators and students. They were repressed, expelled from universities, imprisoned, exiled, and some were murdered. Of the 436 people listed in the Dossier of the Dead and Disappeared for Political Reasons, 125 were students.

Similarly, during the Bolsonaro administration, 76 proceedings were opened using the National Security Law during 2019 and 2020. This also included the persecution of artists, teachers, activists, and influencers who oppose the government. From his inauguration to the present, he has attacked, insulted, and threatened journalists, and when women offend them with depraved sexual content. He has also hindered press access to information.

Hiding the truth and falsifying it was common during the military dictatorship, as it is in this militarized government, with its 100 years of secrecy.

During the Military Dictatorship, the so-called "economic miracle" saw an 11,4% increase in GDP in 1973; however, 13 million children and 28 million adults were starving. Income concentration increased, exacerbating social inequalities, at the cost of wage suppression for workers; wage increases only benefited a small segment of consumers who focused on luxury goods. 

The false “economic miracle” presented an increase in industrial production that benefited only 7,2% of wage earners who earned more than ten minimum wages..

In 1985, José Sarney assumed the Presidency of the Republic with inflation at 242%.

The scandalous corruption cases during the military dictatorship, involving ministers and family members of the presidents, were hushed up; there were no investigations, and the press was muzzled.

During this period, the major strikes in the ABC region of São Paulo emerged, as well as the strike by the labor leader Lula, who was imprisoned for 31 days during the military dictatorship. 

A factory worker and union leader who would become president of the Republic and remove Brazil from the hunger map.

Under Bolsonaro's government, inflation exceeded 10%, unemployment reached 14 million, and 33 million Brazilians lived below the poverty line, with half the population facing food insecurity. In 2019, GDP grew by only 1,4%. In 2020, Brazilian GDP was negative by 4,1% compared to 2019. In 2021, it compensated for the previous year's loss. This year, 2022, it is likely to close between 1% and 2%, but these results are insufficient to generate jobs to compensate for the recession, nor to put food on the table for the people; income inequality remains extremely high. 

It is not enough for GDP to grow if it does not benefit the majority of the population and if it does not decentralize income.

It is inhumane, unjust, sadistic, a rich Brazil and a miserable people, a growing GDP and a people who have lost faith in their living conditions. 

One of the slogans of the Military Dictatorship was this so-called "patriotism" - Love it or leave it; however, what existed was a relationship of subservience to foreign capital. By prioritizing foreign investment, it compromised the country's future. 

The 67 Constitution, in its Article 161, literally "handed over" the Brazilian subsoil to exploration by foreign companies interested in strategic minerals.

In 1977, after 13 years of military rule, 72% of the electrical appliances industry was dominated by foreign companies, as was 99% of the tobacco sector, 69% of transport equipment, 60% of the mechanical industry, and 100% of office machinery. Fifty-two percent of Brazilian foreign trade was in the hands of multinational corporations.

One of the detrimental effects of this dependency was the exorbitant increase in external debt. In just 15 years, the military increased Brazil's external debt 15 times.

Even under the current Bolsonaro government, the same "patriotic" slogan is a sham, a demoralizing show, in which we watch the president saluting the American flag and placing his hand on his chest when he hears the American national anthem, as a demonstration of emotion.

His followers confuse the Brazilian nation with the CBF, one of the most corrupt institutions in the world. They do not value indigenous culture or our quilombola communities, and they shamelessly appropriate national symbols, which belong to all Brazilians.

The Bolsonaro government is subservient to foreign interests in economic matters and to the US in foreign policy, to the point of asking Biden for support for the electoral coup. ""Bolsonarist patriotism" is a fascist, xenophobic, authoritarian, and exclusionary type of nationalism towards foreigners, whose objective is to keep the masses in a paranoid delirium centered on the country, dividing it between those who are considered and those who are not.. Accompanied by a belligerent stance towards Latin American countries. 

It does not foster a proud and active foreign policy, as it did during the Lula and Dilma era, aimed at harmony and respect for the self-determination of peoples and the defense of Brazilian interests; on the contrary, it is a foreign policy that moves along the ideological axis of paranoia about supposed communism, and divides the world between them and us. 

The Alcântara Air Base in Maranhão, leased to the US at a ridiculously low price, the sale and dismantling of Embraer, the hostile takeover of Petrobras, with the liquidation of BR Distribuidora and the decommissioning of refineries, are examples of this sell-out.

Just like during the military dictatorship, the current government has increased the gross domestic public debt, and the projection until the end of its term is for it to increase by more than 75% compared to January 2019.

Speaking of the darker side of the military period in Brazil, there were 200 people investigated, 20 tortured, including 95 children and adolescents, 9540 dead, and 210 still missing. Seven thousand five hundred members of the Armed Forces and firefighters were arrested, many tortured and expelled from their corps; 536 interventions in unions; the extinction and outlawing of student organizations such as UNE and UBES; violation of correspondence of all kinds, breach of bank secrecy and installation of wiretaps, fomenting of hatred and denunciation even among family members. 4.862 parliamentary mandates were revoked, 245 students were expelled from universities by Decree 477; the National Congress was closed three times.

The fascists in this current government threatened to shut down Congress and the Supreme Court – and for the latter, all it would take is a jeep and a cable.

Under Bolsonaro's government, 680 people have died from COVID-19 to date, due to negligence, disregard, denialism, the anti-vaccine movement, backroom deals, etc. Epidemiological researchers state that 4 out of every 5 deaths could have been avoided, that is, 540 lives saved. 

Bolsonaro created the false dichotomy between "life vs. economy," that is, he instilled in the minds of the less informed population that if they stayed home they would starve to death. Instead of creating an emergency program to guarantee the lives of the population.

The government's concern wasn't just economic; they truly adopted the so-called "herd immunity" as a fundamental thesis. Furthermore, they are adherents of Malthusianism and social Darwinism. For the genocidal leader, everyone will die someday, therefore, for him, dying in the pandemic or outside of it is all the same, and may the strongest survive. "He's neither a messiah nor a gravedigger," and to hell with the population. 

The government deliberately caused these deaths to save money and reduce the demands on the health and survival of the people. Above all, it was out of cowardice for not creating a temporary tax on the wealthiest 1% of the population. 

One issue that put us in the global spotlight was the environment. It was during the dictatorship that the destruction of the environment, especially in the Amazon, took a huge leap. In the 1970s, deforestation reached large proportions for the first time, with 14 million hectares devastated. This was fueled by land grabbing by large landowners and the expansion of predatory businesses in the Amazon. 

Among various environmental crimes of the dictatorshipThere was the construction of the Trans-Amazonian Highway, with forced removals and the absence of an environmental impact study. Similarly, with the construction of hydroelectric plants, such as Tucuruí in 1975 (whose impacts were detailed in...). study by Philip M. Fearnside) and those of Balbina, Itaipu and Ilha Solteira. 

One of the great symbols of the persecution of environmental defenders was the assassination of Chico Mendes, a world-renowned rubber tapper leader and forest defender, in 1988.

Since assuming the presidency, the incarnation of evil, also known as Aristides's bride, has launched a destructive attack on the environment, especially in the Amazon and against its people. The results have been: fire and deforestation alerts that have increased even further, and the Brazilian environmental crisis has made headlines around the world. 

Always shifting responsibility to third parties, he claimed the blame lay with NGOs, instead of acting correctly. As the former president of Ibama, Suely Araújo, said, "With Bolsonaro, environmental policy has hit rock bottom," she predicts further setbacks before the end of his term.

The military is not prepared for politics, nor is it authorized by the Constitution to engage in it. This is not our opinion, but history's evidence. 

And it is in this general context that Lula, the former president who took Brazil off the hunger map (and Dilma, who brought about full employment, with a statistic of 4.6% unemployment), emerges on the electoral scene again, after having been imprisoned for 580 days; an imprisonment that made it possible to carry out the electoral coup, with the victory of the current genocidal leader in 2018.

And now, a front unites on one side the defenders of formal political civility and on the other the defenders of barbarism, with a captain and a general at the head. 

The primary goal of the Lula/Alkmin candidacy is to reduce poverty, provide jobs and housing for those in need, and rebuild the democratic rule of law. 

The possibility of winning in the first round is statistically feasible; therefore, it is imperative that activists be where the most needy and excluded from this government are, engaging in dialogue, politicizing, and convincing them to vote for Lula and left-wing candidates for Congress. Setting up stalls in neighborhoods with campaign materials and plenty of patience to engage in persuasive conversations, the same at bus terminals, I believe is an effective method. Flag waving is nice, exciting, and encouraging, but it doesn't convince on its own.

In these few remaining days, a concentrated effort is needed, a collective effort to secure that final vote for Lula, because, as the polls are showing, voting for any other candidate is to favor Bolsonaro/Braga Neto going to the second round.

The same probability of victory has its counterpoint in the desperation and recklessness of the genocidal leader and his henchmen. It will be up to democratic institutions to disarm, with courage and constitutional duty, any adventure of the sociopath in power.  

In the novel The Eighteenth Brumaire of Louis BonaparteMarx writes that "Men make their own history, but they do not make it as they please; they do not choose the circumstances under which they are made, but rather the circumstances given to them as they are." 

Never again to dictatorship, enough of Bolsonaro's regime, ever more democracy!

*This text benefited from the research collaboration of Juliana Andrade and Marcelo Calmon Ferreira da Silva.