BRAZIL: Lula’s Tour – Preparing for New Regional Leadership Role

By Mario Osava Reprint | | Print |

Mario Osava

RIO DE JANEIRO, Dec 12 2002 (IPS) - Brazil’s president-elect Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva has raised expectations of a new kind of leadership in the region, capable of reinvigorating relations between countries in the Americas on more equitable, just foundations.

Lula’s visits to four countries – Argentina, Chile, the United States and Mexico – drew positive reactions and awakened unexpected hopes of renewed cooperation, despite the big question mark hanging over the future policies of the leftist former steelworker who takes office Jan 1 amidst severe economic troubles in Latin America’s largest country.

In Mexico, the last stop of his tour, Lula and Mexican President Vicente Fox discussed ways to bolster bilateral trade and combat the agricultural protectionism practiced by industrialised nations. ”We must export more, to promote growth” of our countries, said the president-elect.

He also met Wednesday in Mexico with the head of the centre- left Party of the Democratic Revolution, Cuauhtémoc Cárdenas, who he referred to as an ”old compañero.”

But the main course was his visit to Washington Tuesday. Lula’s meeting with U.S. President George W. Bush inaugurated a new stage in Brazil’s relations with the United States, according to the president-elect.

Bush’s suggestion of a meeting between the two presidents in the second quarter of 2003 to launch a common agenda opens a political dialogue that was seen as virtually inconceivable under the current circumstances, given the White House’s absorption in the ”war on terrorism” and pressing problems in the Middle East and other regions.

Analysts said Bush’s proposal for a meeting seemed to indicate a new stance towards Brazil on the part of Washington, in contrast to the chill of recent years. Bush and Lula are to get together somewhere in Brazil, at Bush’s request, despite the U.S. president’s well-known aversion to travelling abroad.

Brazil and the United States have frequently clashed over the talks for the creation of the Free Trade Area of the Americas (FTAA), trade disputes, and discrepancies over questions like the U.S. military presence in the fight against drug trafficking in Colombia and Washington’s four-decade economic blockade against Cuba.

That gives rise to expectations for an even greater distance between the conservative Republican Bush and the left-wing Lula, the leader of the Workers’ Party (PT), which was born 22 years ago flying the banners of nationalism, anti-imperialism, social revolution, and admiration for Fidel Castro’s communist Cuba.

But Lula took a pragmatic stance in the campaign that led to his landslide victory on Oct 27, and has continued to tone down his rhetoric as he prepares to govern, especially with respect to his future foreign policy.

The president-elect has repeatedly given his assurances that he will honour Brazil’s international obligations, such as an agreement signed with the International Monetary Fund (IMF), which will restrict his government’s economic maneuvering room during the first year of his term.

His team of advisers also cleared up many of the doubts and worries plaguing investors, thus averting even worse financial turmoil.

”Frank and direct” dialogue between presidents can help foster relations of mutual respect and benefit, by acknowledging common interests and differences in levels of development, said Lula.

He also reiterated that bilateral and regional relations must not be limited to trade, and that Brazil wants to ”deepen” development aid and cooperation to strengthen democracy, peace, and efforts against organised crime and poverty in all countries of the Americas.

Lula’s travels abroad, which began in Argentina and Chile last week, reflected his diplomatic priorities, the first of which is to strengthen the Southern Common Market (Mercosur) trade bloc through strategic integration that goes ”beyond trade,” based on European Union-style common policies, which should eventually be extended to all of South America.

Lula has earned the backing of many Argentinians, who are placing their hopes on Brazil for effective support in overcoming Argentina’s economic and social collapse.

Argentina’s recovery is necessary for the reconstruction of the Mercosur, South America’s leading free trade pact, made up of Argentina, Brazil, Paraguay and Uruguay, and associate members Bolivia and Chile.

If Brazil intends to reinforce the bloc, it will have to make concessions to its partners, especially Argentina, to help it recover, Tullo Vigévani, a professor of international relations at the State University of Sao Paulo, told IPS.

”Embracing the regional cause” will be Lula’s route to success given the formidable internal challenges that his government will face, like rising inflation, the devaluation of the local currency, high unemployment, and the president-elect’s commitment to reducing poverty, according to economist Paulo Rabello de Castro.

Assuming a leadership role and focusing on ”action based on solidarity” in South America will help Brazil revive its economy, if it is also able to expand trade within the region and attract more of the capital currently available in the world as a result of the recession plaguing the world’s leading economies, argued Rabello de Castro in an article published in Wednesday’s edition of the daily newspaper Folha de Sao Paulo.

With respect to drawing investment, the analyst pointed to the Initiative for Regional South American Infrastructure, promoted by the outgoing Brazilian government of Fernando Henrique Cardoso, which selected 160 transportation, energy and communication projects that will boost physical integration in South America.

Argentina is Brazil’s biggest foreign policy problem, due to the effect of that country’s crisis on the cost of external debt, which explains the need for Brazil to assist its Mercosur partner, as well as the fact that it was Lula’s first stop as president- elect.

Rabello de Castro said Chile was his second destination because the country’s international prestige is vital to fostering cooperation within South America.

BRAZIL: Lula’s Tour – Preparing for New Regional Leadership Role

By Mario Osava Reprint | | Print |

Mario Osava

RIO DE JANEIRO, Dec 12 2002 (IPS) - Brazil’s president-elect Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva has raised expectations of a new kind of leadership in the region, capable of reinvigorating relations between countries in the Americas on more equitable, just foundations.
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