Lessons from Dilma

Apr 15, 2012 Editorial

When Dilma Rousseff was elected the president of Brazil in October 2010, she did so as the protégé of her enormously popular predecessor President Luis Ignacio Lula. She had been his chief of staff and energy minister. Fears were expressed that she was just a stalking horse for Lula and in the interregnum, might prove to be just a puppet of the latter.
Now after a year in office, such talk has long dissipated. With an approval rating of 77 percent, far above the 51 per cent Lula had earned after his first year, Dilma has surprised many.
How did she do it? Some may attribute her high ratings to the normal ‘honeymoon’ period accorded to new administrations. Others have pointed out that the economy continued its phenomenal performance built up during the Lula years.
There might be something to these rationales. In 2011, Brazil added 2.3 million formal jobs to the economy and reached all-time lows of unemployment of 5.2 percent in November. Brazil’s trade surplus reached $29.79 billion last year, a 32 percent increase from 2010. Brazil overtook the United Kingdom as the world’s sixth-largest economy in December. This latter accomplishment has swollen the patriotic fervour of all Brazilians and has made them look at their head of state quite benignly.
But there is much more substance to Dilma’s rise in popular esteem. In addition to her stand on poverty and unemployment, she has demonstrated that she is quite willing to take a stand on the issue that is high on the agenda of most Brazilians: corruption. Interestingly, she was chosen as a candidate over several others who were not technocrats like her but elected politicians, because these individuals had all been embroiled in charges of corruption.
In her first year, she dismissed six of her 38 ministers fingered in influence-peddling allegations, embezzlement or abuse of power.
This tough and determined approach in addressing corruption and her no-nonsense manner has earned Rousseff the sobriquet, “the Iron Lady” in allusion to the indomitable Maggie Thatcher of Britain. In this vein she also signed two major transparency Bills into law: one to create a truth commission to investigate dictatorship-era abuses, and a landmark freedom of information law.
In foreign affairs, Dilma, who was a radical in her youth, has proven to be less reflexively ideological than the charismatic Lula. For instance while Lula seemed to enjoy tweaking the US’s nose, Dilma has been nuanced. She’s been more forthright in criticising human rights violations in general and specifically in the case of Iran – positive to the US, but simultaneously recognising Palestine.
After hosting President Obama in Brazil she reciprocated with a visit to Washington this month, where she forthrightly informed Obama that the US policy of low interest rates in T-Bills was causing an influx of speculative funds into her country. This was causing its currency to appreciate and giving it a trade disadvantage. She emphasised that Brazil wants foreign currency that is ‘productive’.
Dilma has also been a strong supporter of developing countries and has taken a firm stand to transform BRICS (Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa) into a world force and not just a convenient acronym. On the global stage, Rousseff continued to assert Brazil’s growing influence. She became the first woman to open the UN General Assembly, where she championed women’s rights.
Rousseff also made several strategic official trips, including a visit to China in April and a brief African tour in October.
But Rousseff faces challenges in 2012, in part due to global financial worries. The growth rate shrunk from 7.5 percent in 2010, to 2.87 percent in 2011, and is expected to grow 3.3 percent this year. In trying to nip rising inflation she has cut $27.18 billion from this year’s budget – and vetoed wage increases for pensioners and public servants.
As a pragmatist she might have to lower her sights even on emblematic anti-poverty programmes, such as the “Brazil Without Misery” programme, launched in June, which aims to lift 16 million Brazilians out of extreme poverty.
A leader has to do what a leader has to do.

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