Boulos link with MTST becomes a tension point for 2024 – 05/28/2023 – Politics

The link between federal deputy Guilherme Boulos (PSOL) and the MTST (Movement of Homeless Workers) became a point of tension for the pre-candidate for Mayor of São Paulo, with insinuations from rivals about electoral use and the group’s clashes with Ricardo Nunes (MDB), who is seeking re-election.

Both the current mayor and federal deputy Ricardo Salles (PL) raised their criticisms of the housing movement. To wear down the psolista, the former Minister of the Environment compares the group’s invasions to those practiced by the MST (Movement of Landless Rural Workers).

Rapporteur of the MST CPI installed in the Chamber, Salles said in an interview with Sheet that “the MTST is the urban version of the MST” and that the commission can investigate it as well.

“Nothing prevents us from analyzing these examples, which are analogous to the MST […]. I think it’s legitimate to show what this group [MTST] do in cities. Brazilians want to know what is the coincidence of behavior and procedures between what is done in the countryside and the invasions in the cities”, he said.

Boulos, in turn, stated that Salles “wants to make electoral use of the CPI, wants to use the CPI on stage to make his candidacy viable in São Paulo”.

Today Boulos is considered the favorite candidate by strategists from Salles and Nunes — opponents who are fighting a parallel dispute to face the leftist in the second round. In addition to the three candidates, candidates are being considered for federal deputies Tabata Amaral (PSB) and Kim Kataguiri (União Brasil) and presenter José Luiz Datena (PDT).

Boulos, who has the support of President Lula (PT), has been leader of the MTST since 2002. The link had already been explored against the psolist in the 2020 election, when he reached the second round against Bruno Covas (PSDB). His allies say he will never disown the group, but that each has its own agenda.

The problems have intensified in recent weeks, first with a camp set up in front of the city hall in protest against Nunes and then with actions by the GCM (Metropolitan Civil Guard) in an MTST food distribution center in the Praça da Sé region.

The group started the demonstration in front of Nunes’ office in mid-March to complain about non-compliance with an agreement involving Vila Nova Palestine, an area occupied by the MTST in the south zone and which is the target of a request for expropriation for the construction of popular housing.

The mayor, who denies having made the commitment and claims that the land is in an environmental protection zone, reacted by saying that there was a party-political bias behind the act. “I’m not going to fall for that”, he declared, when talking about the use of movements to guide the electoral debate.

The MTST representative returned the attack, saying that the mayor was confusing his role as administrator with the 2024 election. According to Boulos, the agreement on New Palestine was signed with Covas and reiterated by Nunes and sectors of the city hall. In addition, he says that the project respects environmental legislation.

This month, the MTST pointed to signs of retaliation with the visit of municipal guards to a unit of the Solidarity Kitchen project where lunchboxes are prepared for homeless people. Donations were only allowed after an inspection by the Health Surveillance, which found no irregularities.

The movement said the GCM had been going to the scene in previous weeks, with increasingly embarrassing and aggressive interventions, and said it was “atrocious inhumanity to prevent hungry people from being fed”.

Another topic of conflict between Boulos and Nunes is the issue of homeless people. The psolista even called the Public Prosecutor’s Office to prevent the city hall from removing tents in the central region.

The MTST claims that there are about 50,000 people in this condition in the capital, based on a survey by the Brazilian Observatory of Public Policies with the Homeless Population, while the city hall counts around 30,000.

Allies of Nunes claim that the action of the Sanitary Surveillance, with the accompaniment of the GCM, was commonplace and that the MTST creates narratives to scratch the city hall. The order is not to fall into provocations.

Like Salles, the mayor’s team should explore the connection between the MTST and Boulos in a negative way, pointing to environmental problems and even criminality in the movement’s camps.

Trouble and depredation should also be associated with the invasions, as opposed to Nunes’ administration, which will be presented as thoughtful and safe, valuing order and respect.

In any case, the mayor’s assistants believe that the MTST should not encourage demonstrations and road closures during the election period to avoid the accusation that it sows chaos.

Salles, who wants to run with the support of former president Jair Bolsonaro (PL), turns to the MTST to try to paste the label of extremist and radical on Boulos’ image. He says, for example, that the opponent gained political projection with disorder and “invasion of private and public properties”.

The movement contests messages of this type, stating that it occupies abandoned properties and, in general, have no social function. It also refutes the recurring version that the group charges rent from families.

Advisers who advise Salles in the pre-campaign suggested that the deputy, as rapporteur for the MST’s CPI, take advantage of the moment of visibility of the actions of the landless to make a connection with the supposed risk represented by the movement coordinated by Boulos.

The strategy is to insinuate that, if the PSOL deputy becomes mayor, the homeless will be empowered and will feel free to promote similar invasions in the city to those that occurred in the countryside.

For allies of Boulos, the attempt at what they call the criminalization of the housing movement will end up frustrated, just as happened in the 2020 election. The deputy is expected to defend the MTST from attacks and respond with explanations that help humanize the group.

According to Josué Rocha, who coordinates the MTST and works as an advisor in the parliamentary office of Boulos, Nunes’ speech about the political bias of the camp in front of the city hall is refuted by the fact that the group protested against rulers of different positions, from right to left.

“The movement has a pressure relationship with the public power. This is normal. They try to mix things up as a way of criminalizing the movement and attacking its leaders, but they are different instances”, he says.

Rocha claims to be surprised by GCM’s action in Solidarity Kitchen, given that several organizations also distribute food in the region and do not suffer approaches of this type.

The coordinator says that the attempt to reach Boulos through the MTST in 2020 was unsuccessful and that the pace of occupations is dissociated from the electoral calendar. “The actions are not taken with a view to electoral weariness. The MTST is guided solely by the fight for housing.”