BRAZIL The Left in City Hall

...The sixth of ten children, Mayor Erundina taught school to support her younger brothers and sisters while her father worked a parched 25-hectare plot of land and her mother sold handmade leather goods...

...I became active in the labor movement at a time when workers, unions and grass-roots organizations were reacting to the military government, resisting the dictatorship, mobilizing and pressing for the democratization of the country...

...The party was born in the labor unions, the factories, the poor neighborhoods on the outskirts of town, in the struggle of landless peasants, in groups that wanted better health care, in the struggle for freedom of speech and expression...

...So there's a great deal of hope in this administration and popular support to help it succeed...

...Luiza Erundina de Souza is a longtime grass-roots activist and former social worker who helped found the PT in 1980...

...There have been victims in this struggle...

...The polls show Lula in first place in Sao Paulo...

...Many attribute her victory to widespread frustration with the economy and outrage at the violent suppression of a Sdo Paulo teachers strike and the Volta Redonda steelworkers strike just days before the vote...

...What is the role of the progressive church in the PT...

...I was a part of this process...

...Like it or not, your administration is perceived as a kind of preview of how Lula would run his administration as president...

...There seemed to be a change in attitude among many people after you * The New Republic refers to the civilian government that has emerged out of the military dictatorship...

...When I took office, 30% of the bus fleet was paralyzed...

...This will help Lula's candidacy...

...It is a novelty on the Left in Latin America-a party built from the bottom up, a party where the rank-andfile plays a fundamental role in political decision-making...

...Before, pessimism reigned...

...Today this waiting list is rigorously respected...

...He doesn't really have a political party...

...When I was on the city council and in the state legislature, I was always sought out by people who decided to occupy a vacant lot...

...It is not fair to those who have been waiting for years for others who are not on the list to be given priority...

...REPORT ON THE AMER S z 5 z cr w z i Z -----------4 ------------ ---------won...

...The Social Democratic Party consists mainly of former supporters of the military regime...

...So his comments are a way to attack a candidacy that is explicitly leftist...

...I understand this...

...Maybe there is an alternative now...

...I'm a social worker, and I always worked in close contact with the popular movement, with the workers-organizing for change, struggling for people's rights...

...nonproductive property is not...

...Productive property is legitimate...

...These parties made compromises with other class interests...

...The greatest contribution of this electoral victory was to rescue the majority of the Brazilian people, particularly in Sgo Paulo, from the feeling of discouragement, frustration, immobilization, nihilism...

...We have about 140,000 employees, and their salaries are below market levels...

...More striking to her constituents is the fact that she is an immigrant from the rural faminestricken Northeast, and thus a member of southern Brazil's underclass that faces discrimination similar to what Latin American migrants endure in the United States...

...But if we do a minimal amount of things correctly, we will pass an important test, disproving the prejudice that the Left only knows how to be in opposition, that it does not offer any alternatives to solve problems...

...it doesn't make concessions on this point...

...In last year's campaign, Erundina had to overcome the opposition of even her own party's leadership, mustering rank-and-file support to gain the PT nomination...

...So Brizola's strategy is to try to discredit the PT candidate and consequently deny him the right to have the support of the church...

...First, it was a victory that involved the popular movement-the workers, the organized sectors and the labor movement...

...And here I am...

...How do you intend to address these problems...

...We're not building public works, obviously, except for repairing schools...

...Then there was a dispute for the nomination for mayor...

...We are beginning to be able to pay on time what we are buying...

...The PDT isn't even a party...

...The PT is not...

...The decision to occupy land is not simple or easy...

...I do not use repression...

...It will make things easier...

...In 1982, there were municipal elections and the party nominated me for city council...

...Your background is different than that of most politicians...

...I was elected and served as party leader on the Slo Paulo city council for four years...

...Before you became mayor, you supported the homeless who invaded vacant land and were even photographed being dragged away by police during one occupation...

...It is centralized in him...

...And that's why I am where I am...

...These are instruments which at a certain point the working classes decide to use...

...A PT intellectual said after the elections, "We were afraid of the disaster represented by a candidacy in Sdo Paulo of a northeasterner from the state of Paraiba, a woman, a Shi'ite** and, principally, a single woman...

...I'm talking to the construction companies, negotiating payment periods, recommissioning projects and establishing a payment plan within our means...

...The budget hardly allows us to maintain services, to pay something on the debt and pay for the things that we order...

...Why do you say that...

...By the end of February I had already put 300 buses on the road, which meant 200,000 more spaces per day for passengers...

...it] denies the basic rights of human beings...

...This demonstrates the difference...

...The PT also has business people but they are business people from the middle class who had to renounce their class interests to join together with the working classes...

...The new constitution is not being respected...

...Now, as mayor, you are faced with the problem from a different perspective...

...It can be done through the independent and autonomous organization of the workers...

...I agree...

...And now, who knows...

...I think it is natural for a party, one born out of the popular movement, to have an important presence of the church...

...When the party was born, the church had an important presence in these struggles, and many PT activists are leaders of these movements...

...I have 55 schools being repaired...

...I have to administer this debt...

...When there is vacant land in an urban center where half of the population is living in poor housing, in shantytowns or slums, the social function of property is not being respected...

...Shi'ite" is the term used for those who are considered radicals within the PT...

...Some people have said that the real winner in the elections was the church, that the progressive church has an extraordinary level of influence and participation in the PT...

...There is coherence between my behavior today and as a city countil person and state legislator...

...Labor activists were expressing themselves politically, and I participated in this...

...I served as party leader in the legislature during the year and a half that I was there...

...At the same time, you entered the electoral process and became mayor of Brazil's largest city and your party's candidate has a good chance of being elected president...

...Leonel Brizola, the ex-governor of Rio de Janeiro and presidential candidate for the Democratic Labor Party (PDT), has criticized this participation...

...But now voters are demonstrating personally-by telephone, letter, telegram-that they support this administration and have confidence in it...

...Last year and this year the PCB and PC do B supported the PT, and this was important...

...Bill Hinchberger is the editor of Third World, a bimonthly magazine published in Brazil...

...This makes him more fragile in relation to Lula who has a party with a clear ideological position, with a structure, with activists...

...Even inside what you call a democratic party, there is discrimination...

...Some 30% of the city's hospital beds are out of service for lack of personnel, lack of equipment, lack of everything...

...The PCB and PC do B are Leninist parties of the most orthodox type...

...We are never thought of as the ones who produce wealth, who take the most difficult jobs, who are the most exploited...

...And with what resources, especially since the city is in debt...

...But even as I force them out of the apartments, I do not deny the need to search with them for a solution...

...See Report on the Americas, March 1989] Her victory-and that of the other Left candidates throughout the country-has upgraded the candidacy of the leader of the PT, Luis Inicio "Lula" da Silva, in the November presidential elections...

...The new mayor inherited a set of problems that seem insurmountable...

...It can be done through social "Who knows, maybe now there is an alternative...

...How did you first get involved in politics...

...Our presence in these struggles was to a large extent to avert police repression and try to find a negotiated solution-and many times we were successful...

...After the elections there was a ray of hope...

...I also catch myself sometimes displaying sexist attitudes towards other women...

...I ran a poverty-stricken campaign: I may not have spent in my entire campaign what other candidates spent in a single day...

...As a democratic, heterogeneous and mass-based party, the PT includes different lines of thought, tactics and conceptions of reality which are joined by a common goal, the construction of socialism...

...The 14 to 16 hours a day that I spend in the office are taken up by administering this daily inferno, besides the political war on top of it all...

...But in other contexts the PCB and PC do B have made concessions, to the point of even supporting the Sarney government...

...This year will be very difficult given the way in which we found the municipal government-in debt, with deteriorated services...

...Normally voters wait for the person elected to solve their problems...

...It is a label that can be used for anything at any time...

...I think Lula's candidacy, the PT's candidacy, has potential in and of itself, independently...

...She then trailed in the polls for months, surging ahead only in the final days to win the election with 30% of the vote over her principal rival, Paulo Maluf, a supporter of the former military government...

...Brizola's position is one of despair because he feels threatened by the PT's candidacy, which has the support not only of the church but also of large segments of society...

...I (MAY 1989) 5I understand that even while the party struggles to end all types of discrimination, we as individuals are still greatly influenced by the dominant ideology and culture...

...My nomination for mayor was an imposition of the rank-and-file...

...In 1986, the party nominated me for state deputy, and I was elected with the largest number of votes of any PT candidate...

...But a large number are still awaiting repairs...

...I don't discard the concept [of armed struggle], as long as it is a decision not just of a party but of the majority of the population...

...But the voters did not let themselves be dominated by the political machine of the state, city and federal governments which backed other candidates...

...Speaking of the problems you face in Sdo Paulo, the list is long: buses stalled for lack of spare parts, some 200,000 children without schools, thousands of people living in shantytowns or substandard housing...

...I won in a contest between myself and the federal deputy, Plinio de Arruda Sampaio...

...I live with a constant problem of finding funds to supply food to schools and day care centers, as well as medicine to health centers and hospitals...

...The PT has a clear class perspective...

...The northeasterner is always considered to be a marginal character, a delinquent, a criminal, a shantytown dweller...

...I'm not going to be able to pay bills for public works that were initiated but which are unnecessary...

...The administrators and politicians who preceded me did not respect the waiting list...

...Jobs, housing, health care and schools are all in short supply in this city of 11 million where more migrants stream in every day...

...The first strikes since the beginning of the military dictatorship were being organized...

...The PDT supported my campaign at the very end, in the final days, while in other states it was linked to the PDS.* It doesn't have a clear ideology or program...

...for example, debts that have accumulated since May 1988 with construction companies on projects that are 20% finished...

...So it is not so simple for a man from the Northeast, a Brazilian man, to behave without any trace of sexism and prejudice...

...We are repairing 300 school REPORT ON THE AMERICAS 5desks a day...

...How do you feel about this...

...As a result of low salaries,] there are problems with the quality of work, so we have to make an effort to develop resources, to motivate, to improve the salary situation so that these people will feel motivated and involved...

...How do you think social struggles should be carried out...

...I never incited land invasions, but I always understood that a public official should be an instrument for those who elected him or her...

...How do you feel about this...

...There is discrimination, sexism, etc., in my party...

...I think these changes are part of an internal and external process, a permanent competition...

...But there is an explicit determination to struggle against discrimination...

...Her right-wing predecessor, Janio Quadros, left a debt equal to one-third of the city budget, as well as several unfinished public works projects...

...It was also a victory of a socialist party with a history of struggle in opposition to the New Republic.* And it was a candidacy of a woman, a northeasterner, a worker...

...In this way you help the [poorer] sectors of society believe in themselves...

...Since I was young, I have been conscious of the need to struggle to guarantee the rights of the people...

...I think it can be done through the vote...

...As a northeasterner...

...During this period, in 1980, I worked with Lula and other comrades linked to the labor movement who were proposing the creation of a political party, which resulted in the founding of the PT...

...A problem related to the budgetary situation is that our public employees are poorly paid...

...You have said several times that you consider armed struggle to be a legitimate means to attain power to transform society...

...These people know the risks of an occupation-including the risks to one's life...

...I think this is the difference...

...struggle...

...The major challenge for me is to prove that the Left is capable, that a woman is capable, that the people were right when they made their choice...

...I won the nomination even though the party leadership supported the other candidate...

...I recognize the legitimacy of this struggle because I agree with the clause in our constitution that defends the social function of property...

...Because we have always been seen in the South as second class citizens, as intruders, as people who mess up the life of the city, as people who cause problems...

...Nobody believed in anything or anybody...

...They had exhausted all means of negotiation with the government...

...If I order people out who have occupied buildings, I do so because I want to respect the rights of those who signed up many years ago and who have been waiting their turns...

...And it can also be done through armed struggle...

...She put herself through college, moving to Sdo Paulo to get her masters degree in social work...

...With all the different types of discrimination, limitations and prejudice inside the PT, it's the only party that allowed room for a woman with my profile, my characteristics...

...Brizola is being forced to the Right at a time when it is clear from the November elections that Brazilian voters want an option on the Left, one of opposition...

...So as mayor of SAo Paulo, I recognize the legitimacy of these occupations...

...And the conservative politicians who control the state and federal governments-and a large part of the city's pursestrings-are loathe to cooperate with a Marxist mayor...

...Some observers have said that your victory was the greatest electoral advance for the Latin American Left since Salvador Allende became president of Chile in 1970...

...Until the November elections, Brizola seemed to feel that he had the support of the Left sewn up...

...It is true that the climate changed just prior to the elections and afterwards, and that climate still exists...

...There she entered the labor movement and political life, and was elected to the city council and state legislature on the PT slate...

...VOLUME XXIII, NO...

...In another party this would never happen...

...They are offering their services, offering to do volunteer work...

...But it shouldn't be a party that decides...

...I understand that this responsibility presents us with an additional challenge...

...It will increase his chances...

...Thinking not only in terms of the party, but in society in general, have you suffered more discrimination as a woman or as a northeasterner...

...How does the PT differ from the communist parties: the Brazilian Communist Party (PCB), which comes out of the Soviet-line tradition, and the Communist Party of Brazil (PC do B), which split off from the PCB and is identified with the Albanian line...

...It includes people from the upper classes, capitalists, as well as workers...