BRAZIL-US: Lula and Bush – ‘Opposites Get Along’ says Analyst

By Mario Osava Reprint | | Print |

Mario Osava

RIO DE JANEIRO, Dec 10 2002 (IPS) - The meeting in Washington Tuesday between Brazil’s left-wing president-elect Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva and President George W. Bush, a conservative Republican, is no duel between adversaries, say some analysts in Brazil.

”Opposites get along when it comes to international relations in which as many common as divergent interests are at stake,” Clovis Brigagao, director of the Centre for Studies on the Americas at the Candido Mendes University in Rio de Janeiro, said in an interview with IPS.

Although Lula and Bush hold radically different views on many political and economic questions, the relations of Lula, the leader of the leftist Workers’ Party (PT), with the world – or more precisely, the reaction of many conservative international leaders to his ascent to power – have changed radically since he won a landslide victory in Latin America’s largest country on Oct 27.

The U.S. government and international financial markets, which prior to the elections in Brazil were emitting signals that were unfavourable to the candidate, leading to a steady weakening of the Brazilian currency, took a different stance after his triumph in the runoff election.

Before flying to Washington, Lula met in Sao Paulo, Brazil’s biggest city, with the managing-director of the International Monetary Fund (IMF), Horst Koehler, who said he was impressed by the president-elect’s commitment to tackling the country’s pressing social problems while following prudent, sound economic policies.

Washington is even ready to help out with the ”zero hunger” social spending programme that Lula has announced as the top priority of his future government, aimed at guaranteeing three square meals a day for everyone in Brazil by the end of his four- year term.

Lula and Bush will have no trouble getting along, despite the ”unilateralism” of U.S. foreign policy since the Sep 11, 2001 terrorist attacks on New York and Washington, said Brigagao.

The United States would not be so ”foolish” as to demand that the Lula government support the unilateral policies it is following under the argument of fighting terrorism, because Bush is keen on shoring up U.S. relations with Latin America, under ”responsible leadership” by Brazil, said the analyst.

”Realpolitik”, the pragmatism required in foreign policy, makes compromises and concessions necessary on both sides. But Brazil has already made many, and that puts Lula in a ”strong bargaining position” to demand reciprocity, said the analyst.

Brazil has followed the prescriptions of Washington, the IMF and the World Bank on open trade, privatisation and fiscal adjustment. It also signed the Treaty for the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons, another demand set forth by the powers of the industrialised North.

Lula and his economic team have already made it clear that they will take as tough a stance in the talks on the Free Trade Area of the Americas (FTAA) in defence of Brazilian interests as the United States is taking in defence of its own.

The continent-wide free trade area is one of the central focuses of Lula’s meeting with Bush.

Brazil’s position is strengthened by the presence in Washington of Ambassador Rubens Barbosa, which is of help to Lula, said Brigagao.

Barbosa sponsored a detailed study of U.S. protectionist measures, which are specifically aimed at several of Brazil’s most competitive products, like orange juice, steel, sugar and tobacco.

The United States is Brazil’s main trading partner.

Lula will travel on to Mexico Wednesday to meet with President Vicente Fox before flying home to prepare for his Jan 1 inauguration.

Last week the president-elect visited Argentina and Chile to demonstrate the high priority he puts on the Mercosur (Southern Common Market – Argentina, Brazil, Paraguay and Uruguay, and associates Chile and Bolivia) and on South American integration.

But on that question, he stressed the need to make the South American trade bloc a political and strategic association that goes beyond mere trade.

He suggested that Chile become a full member of the trade pact, but without the obligation of adopting the bloc’s common foreign tariff.

Differences on import policies are the main obstacle to full membership for Chile, which charges a uniform tariff of six percent on all imports, while Mercosur duties range from zero to 35 percent, averaging 14 percent.

But both Chile and Mercosur are interested in full integration, due to the increased weight it would give the region in international negotiations like the FTAA talks.

In Brigagao’s view, the Lula administration should continue to follow the foreign policy of the outgoing government of President Fernando Henrique Cardoso, although with some ”differences in tone.”

That policy is focused, above all, on the strengthening of South American integration, ”which has moved forward, albeit slowly,” since the summit that brought 12 South American presidents together in Brasilia two years ago, he pointed out.

Brazil’s foreign policy has taken on a character of its own, marked by a degree of autonomy with respect to whichever party happens to be in power, and implemented by a professional foreign ministry that is seen as one of the governmental bodies least affected by changes in government.