The imperative of unity and the end of illusions.

There's a question that begs to be asked. Has the struggle for unity among leftist, democratic, popular, and progressive forces become imperative now, after the right wing, wrongly called the center, betrayed Ciro Gomes and all those who harbored illusions about building a front with coup plotters, or was it already mandatory since the impeachment coup and throughout these two years of the anti-popular and traitorous regime led by Temer and Maia?

Sadly, Ciro was a victim, used as a pawn in an auction conducted by the indefatigable Rodrigo Maia, a perennial right-winger who speculated with the promise of support for the PDT pre-candidate in order to sell his support for Alckmin's PSDB at a high price.

Those who wanted to be deceived were wrong. Today, amidst loud lamentations about the lost chance of having a competitive candidate representing the center-left, there is a frantic race to reach last-minute agreements and arrangements in which some seek to transform the unity of the left, previously abhorred as an expression of sectarianism, into yet another tactic to pressure Lula into Plan B.

With great insight, the legitimate president of Brazil, Dilma Rousseff, during the São Paulo Forum held from July 15 to 17 in Havana, in her speech to delegates and guests from Latin America and around the world, including heads of state and government, compared these pressures to those she herself suffered from the right and the left to resign from office, as part of an agreement that would lead to a non-traumatic political exit between 2016 and 2017 and avoid impeachment.

The question of the political timing in which unity became imperative could also be formulated by taking more recent chronological references. Was the commitment to unity among progressive forces urgent and indispensable even before the imprisonment and conviction of President Lula, whose presidential candidacy already showed potential for victory, provided it was supported not only by his party, but by the entire left, at least the most consistent sectors that have always marched with the Workers' Party leader for the past 30 years?

The formation of a progressive front led by Lula and the consequent forces of the left – even if it didn't take the form of an electoral coalition – was already imperative at the beginning of this year. Combined with the Popular Brazil Front, to which organized social movements converge, this front would have been a significant political force in the evolution of the political landscape. Related issues, such as hegemony, occupation of spaces, division of tasks, responsibilities, and leadership roles, could be addressed responsibly and with a spirit of unity, based on the tried and true method of progressive consensus.

Despite rhetorical calls, unity among leftist, popular, and progressive forces has not been achieved because it is still not seen as a strategic and principled issue. The result is its electoral instrumentalization or its conceptual and practical degeneration.

Albert Camus said that by misnaming an object, you contribute to increasing the unhappiness of the world. This is the result of some insisting on labeling the center-right as such, confusing individual or collective political actors who honestly assume a historical or conjunctural position as members of the democratic center, with right-wing forces that, out of cowardice or pragmatic interest, prefer to present themselves with the label of centrist. In Brazilian history, there are abundant examples of patriots and democrats who, not being left-wing, and many others who, having broken with the right wing to which they belonged, played a remarkable progressive role as part of a democratic center that contributed to the progressive struggle. And there are also examples of the opposite, as evidenced by the current usurper.

The confusion is not semantic, but an expression of political disorientation or of political and ideological choices that veer towards opportunism. The democratic center has already played a prominent role in the democratization of the country and even in the Workers' Party governments. Those sectors that call themselves the "centrão" (center bloc) under the leadership of right-wing figures like Rodrigo Maia, however, constitute the vanguard of the retrograde ruling classes seeking a political way out of the coup regime.

The communist leader João Amazonas (1912-2002), an enthusiast of the unity of progressive forces, so much so that he very rightly spearheaded the articulations that resulted in Tancredo Neves' candidacy in the Electoral College (1985), drew attention to the transmutation of centrist forces and their demise as a vector of democratic and progressive struggle in Brazil on at least three occasions. In the 1988 Constituent Assembly, when a bloc was formed, which was then also called the Centrão; in Collor's election, when the message of the various centrist candidates, due to insufficient content and credibility, failed; and in both of FHC's elections, for the same reason. The transmutation of the PSDB and PMDB into neoliberal, conservative, and right-wing forces was part of this process.

The 2016 coup against President Dilma was the culmination of this process, which is also expressed in the actions of employers' associations. With FIESP and Paulo Skaf at the forefront, these entities openly adopted a pro-coup stance and became spearheads of the movements in favor of impeachment.

Misunderstandings about the role of the right disguised as the center are linked to a different conception of strategy and tactics regarding the stage and level of political struggle under the coup regime. Prominent leaders of the left began to defend the bizarre thesis of depolarization between right versus left, PSDB versus PT. They copied the label of end of cycle, end of Lulaism, bankruptcy of the PT from some article in a foreign language, pasted it onto their analysis of the current situation, and went in search of the lost center, wasting precious time and energy that could have been invested in building a solid broad front nucleated by the left and supported by the popular movement.

The 2016 coup objectively inaugurated a new stage in the democratic and popular struggle, implying a new correlation of forces and new political alignments. Acting in 2017 with the tenets of the March 1958 Declaration in mind will only lead the left to new disasters. A consistent left needs discernment and lucidity, detachment and methodology to dialogue, compose, and constitute unified instruments that enhance its strength and enable it to face the great political battles of today. The electoral coalition and the Popular Brazil Front can be the embryo of a paradigm of unity among the political and social movements polarized by the formations of the left.

Unity among the left and the popular movement at a high level is unavoidable. However, reconciliation with the forces behind the coup would result in fatal surrender and inevitable defeat.

It is necessary to prepare for major struggles. The science of political struggle, for consistent left-wing forces, consists of adopting the tactical procedures indispensable for winning conjunctural battles without losing sight of the strategic objectives of social transformation, of achieving a new progressive regime.

These forces urgently need a tactical arrangement that will allow them to defeat the right wing at the polls in October. United, around the candidacy that represents hope, resistance, and struggle.