Merval predicts a boycott upon returning from recess.

247 – Globo columnist Merval Pereira predicts more "boycotts" from the PMDB against the government in Congress when parliamentarians return to work. Read more:

Rough game

Congress returns to work in the first days of August with a well-defined project: to overturn some of President Dilma's vetoes. Led by Congressman Eduardo Cunha and with the support of the Speaker of the House, Henrique Alves, the PMDB bloc intends to continue its boycott of the Presidential Palace until this power struggle clearly defines who's who in the governing alliance.

The PT (Workers' Party) made its first retreat, removing from the official text of its convention the references to the need to review alliances with conservative parties. The statement was clearly aimed at the PMDB (Brazilian Democratic Movement Party). But the dispute in the Chamber of Deputies doesn't only involve the PMDB. Factions within the PT, dissatisfied with the government's performance, especially in the economic area, are also fueling rebellion within the allied base, seeking a political climate that favors Lula's return.

Even though this hypothesis is unlikely, working towards it would wear down President Dilma and increase the pressure from her own party members. Although she formally has an alliance encompassing about 70% of Congress, support for the Planalto Palace in votes has been declining since the beginning of the government, reaching its lowest point this year, with only about 45% approval in votes, the same rate, incidentally, as the PMDB party, which indicates that it is the PMDB that is setting the pace of action in the governing alliance. It is no coincidence that the leader of the PMDB is Congressman Eduardo Cunha.

The anticipation of the electoral process has brought the economic issue, especially inflation, into the discussion. As the debate on inflation is placed at the center of political discussion and electoral contests, it is fueled by expectations.

Furthermore, the candidate cannot take the measures that the president needs to take to combat inflation. The president has come to be treated as a candidate, and her judgment is based on that capacity. The early election calendar is an abstraction that neurotizes politics. Politicians live by a calendar that is not real.

Dialogue with the parties in the government's base is difficult because the role of the President of the Republic is essentially political, and the existence of the Ministry of Institutional Relations cannot replace the president's direct relationship with politicians. Fernando Henrique and Lula brought the political leadership to them. After the Mensalão scandal, Lula realized he would have to deal directly with politicians.

The politicians who used to act as intermediaries were more operational, they were "on the front lines," as the political jargon goes, but the ones who decided everything were the owners of the shop, the presidents. Today, it's different. Those who are "on the front lines" lack experience in political activism, and the president, as the shop owner, doesn't find pleasure in the practice of politics.

When the election comes up, members of parliament start thinking ahead about the polling stations and the work of campaign workers, who also start making demands earlier. But we are a year away from the October election.

Those who don't follow Pope Francis and don't engage in politics with a capital P take advantage of these occasions, even if the medium-term result is the weakening of their own party. Those who act like looters want chaos, analyze experts on the actions of the lower clergy, using the image of vandals in action during recent popular demonstrations.

The difference between the internal struggles within the PT (Workers' Party) and the institutional actions of the PMDB (Brazilian Democratic Movement Party) exemplifies political action in these times of coalition presidentialism. Sectors within the PT accuse the PMDB of holding the government hostage and pressure President Dilma to break the "conservative" alliance.

At the same time, the PMDB seems much more concerned with preserving Dilma's government than the PT, because by acting this way it preserves its own presence in the country's leadership and the political spaces it occupies. Conversely, what is happening in the PT is a brutal struggle for political control of the party machine, at a time when the leading figures of a generation of party leaders could end up in jail.

And the more space the PMDB occupies, the less space is left for the groups that operate within the PT.