As the impeachment crisis in Brazil reaches a climax, it’s likely to see a regime change, writes Héctor Perla Jr.
Brazil’s government is in the news, but is it in the middle of a coup? The country’s turmoil involves no armies, no bloodshed, but it could see a regime change, a “soft coup”.
I’ve been studying Latin American politics for 20 years, documenting the right-wing strategy of manipulating public opinion to discredit socialist governments.
In Brazil, the Workers Party (PT) won the presidency in 2003 and has remained in power. Led by Luis Inácio Lula da Silva, a charismatic leader Newsweek called “the most popular politician on Earth”, the PT built its appeal on economic policies that generated growth with low inflation and created social programmes for income redistribution.
In 2011, Dilma Rousseff replaced her mentor and became the first female president. She never enjoyed the same popularity as Lula, who was implicated this year in a corruption and money-laundering case involving the state-owned oil company Petrobras. Prosecutors have not accused Rousseff of being involved, but the speaker of Brazil’s lower house has pushed forward impeachment charges against her for alleged misuse of money from public banks to cover gaps in the government budget. Both Lula and Rousseff have accused right-wing parties of conspiring to bring down the PT presidency, calling it a coup attempt.
But there is a deeper story than just corruption or opportunism by Rousseff’s adversaries. Events in Latin America suggest what’s happening in Brazil is part of a broad right-wing campaign to tarnish the PT and bring down Rousseff, as well as Lula.
Using a range of tactics, right-wing parties seek to tarnish left-wing politicians in power through institutional, non-electoral and undemocratic means.
Read Also:
We’ve seen a similar backlash against socialist regimes play out in Paraguay and Honduras. Right-wing parties have tried to undermine left-wing regimes in Bolivia, Ecuador, El Salvador and Venezuela. Those on the left being targeted by the Latin American right see this strategy as the equivalent of a 21st century coup.
In the Brazilian case, the calls for impeachment are based on flimsy charges and double standards. There is no evidence linking Rousseff to the corruption scandal. Meanwhile, the Brazilian speaker of the House, Eduardo Cunha, who is leading the impeachment charge, was named in the Panama Papers as taking bribes from a multinational corporation involved in the Petrobras case. Likewise, many of the other right-wing politicians leading and supporting the impeachment efforts are facing corruption charges themselves.
If the impeachment succeeds, Temer would be the first president of Brazil representing his party (the PMDB) in over 25 years.
But he himself may soon face impeachment charges for corruption.
While the right’s targeting of Rousseff could be unethical, it is legal. But impeachment proceedings are only one element of the right’s backlash against socialist governments in Latin America.
The most powerful and illegal attacks against the left in Latin America involve surveillance, hacking and cyberattacks, including smear campaigns via social media and news outlets.
A judge ordered Brazil’s wiretapping of calls between Rousseff and Lula so there is an appearance of a legal justification, then the transcripts of their conversations were released to the public. Right-wing news outlets and social media began manipulating these to give the appearance of wrongdoing.
While this might sound like a conspiracy theory, a recent Bloomberg story, “How to Hack an Election”, uncovered the depth of this right-wing strategy.
Hacker Andres Sepulveda faces prison time for his role in a right-wing movement interfering in various Latin American elections. He wasn’t hired to work in Brazil, but the smear campaign against Rousseff takes a page directly out of his playbook.
The PT is not likely to fold even if Rousseff’s impeachment moves forward. But what happens in the coming weeks in Brazil has longer-term implications for elected socialist governments throughout Latin America.
*Héctor Perla is an assistant professor of Latin American and Latino Studies at the University of California at Santa Cruz
