PT meeting: Lula’s ministers hear complaints about the economy – 12/08/2023 – Power

The PT national directory meeting this Friday (8) was marked by criticism from PT members of the economic policy of Minister Fernando Haddad (Finance), the presence of Jair Bolsonaro’s supporters in the government and the treatment given to the party by the Lula administration.

The complaints were made to two ministers from the Planalto Palace. Appointed to defend the Executive’s actions, Rui Costa (Civil House) and Alexandre Padilha (Institutional Relations) also heard complaints about government communication and requests for greater presence of ministers in states.

Rui and Padilha opened the PT meeting with speeches in defense of Lula’s performance. The Minister of the Civil House presented a Powerpoint with government data throughout the year and said that the economy is not better because the Central Bank did not lower interest rates any further.

Padilha stated that the government’s main measures in Congress were approved this year and that it is necessary to have conditions for governability, implicitly defending the alliance with parties in the center that once supported Bolsonaro. He also said, according to reports, that it is better to suffer the pain of being a government than being an opposition.

Shortly after the statements, PT president Gleisi Hoffmann, who has already expressed criticism of the policy outlined by Haddad, emphatically defended maintaining the current level of investment forecasts. She asked for “not a penny less” and also the creation of a growth target.

According to participants, there were complaints about the government’s relationship with the PT party in Congress and party mayors, who would be overlooked in relation to the center’s acronyms, such as PP, Republicans and União Brasil.

Vice-president of the PT, Washington Quaquá defended that PT members have privileged treatment in relation to their new allies from the center, including in the release of amendments. In front of Rui, Quaquá complained about the actions of the Civil House and criticized the lack of centrality in the government. He also said that Gleisi would be the only one with the authority to coordinate the ministers.

Rui also heard criticism of the public security policy in Bahia, the state he governed for eight years.

Senator Humberto Costa (PT-PE) voiced his complaint about the condescension with which Bolsonaristas are treated by members of the government. He said that the presence in the federal administration of Bolsonaro voters who have always aggressively criticized Lula and the PT “demoralizes militancy.”

Another party leader specifically complained about the invitation to a Bolsonaro senator to an inauguration without PT members having been notified about the event.

Parliamentarians also criticized the government’s communication, suggesting that the actions are not reaching the end.

At the same meeting this Friday, the PT national directory approved a resolution critical of the role of the center and Lula’s economic policy, but the text may still undergo changes.

Presented by the political wing integrated by the president, the PT tendency CNB (Building a New Brazil), the text was approved by 25 votes. PT members created a group to debate possible changes to the document, which includes suppressive amendments and additions. The suggestion will be put to a vote.

“Brazil needs to urgently free itself from the dictatorship of the BC [Banco Central] ‘independent’ and fiscal austericide, or we will not be able to respond to the country’s needs”, says an excerpt.

The resolution states that the bloc of parties from the so-called centrão exerts disproportionate influence in the Legislature and tries to deform the political agenda that was victorious in the presidential election.

By preaching the organization of the party to change the correlation of forces in the Legislature, the PT document states that it is undeniable that its political field remains a minority in the National Congress.

“The conservative and physiological forces of the so-called centrão, strengthened by the absurd rule of the imposed budget in a presidential regime, exert disproportionate influence over the Legislative and Executive branches, delaying, embarrassing and even trying to deform the victorious political agenda in the presidential election.”

The text says that the government respects the legitimacy of a Congress equally elected by the population. But it proposes a joint effort by PT leaders and ministers, in addition to their allies, to bring to the population the political-transformative content of the changes and reconstruction of the country.

Once again, the PT defends the accountability and punishment of the political commanders, civilian or military, of the January 8 attacks, “starting with Jair Bolsonaro, so that they never threaten democracy again.”

Approval of the text precedes a debate on economic policy that will bring Haddad and Gleisi to the table.

Gleisi has already made public criticisms of the BC’s autonomy, in addition to internally questioning the setting of a zero deficit target for next year, a policy adopted by Haddad.

The PT president is a member of the CNB, as is Haddad. Lula’s current holds the largest number of seats in the national directory.

The approval of the document caused discomfort among ministers in the Lula government, who complained about the directory meeting being held on the same day as the opening of a conference in Brasília that will bring together more than 4,000 pre-candidates for mayors and councilors.

After listing advances in economic policy, the document states that “the pressure for fiscal tightening exerted by the BC command, rentiers and their spokespeople in the media and in the market makes no sense in this scenario.”

The proposed resolution says that thanks to Lula’s credibility and despite Roberto Campos Neto’s BC, inflation has fallen and is under control, employment has increased, and the population’s income has improved.