Advertisement

Minus Leader, Brazil Facing Power Struggle

Share
Times Staff Writer

Without the leadership of President-elect Tancredo Neves, who has been hospitalized since his scheduled inauguration March 15, Brazil’s new democracy is drifting into power struggles and policy conflicts on pressing issues.

Neves, 75, went through another crisis Tuesday when his temperature and blood pressure fell and his heartbeat speeded up, with some sources saying it was lowered from 160 beats per minute only after doctors gave him a heart massage.

The changes in his vital signs, which were later reported back to normal, came after Neves underwent a tracheotomy. The operation, in which a hole is opened in the throat and a breathing tube inserted, had been declared a success.

Advertisement

Government Must Go On

Since March 14, Neves has had abdominal surgery five times and fought serious infection, and Brazil’s political, business and military leaders are convinced that the new government will have to go on without the president-elect’s personal involvement for at least many months.

The opposition parties in the coalition that elected Neves have declared that under the leadership of Vice President Jose Sarney, who has been acting president, they will carry forward the program of economic recovery and social reforms that Neves promised.

But the Cabinet, made up of 26 civilian and military ministers, was chosen by Neves before he was stricken. Thus, personal loyalties and political compromises are involved that were based on Neves’ playing the leading role in final policy decisions.

The government is now being likened to a football team that has lost its quarterback and must try to play under an untested substitute who does not know the playbook.

Neves played his political cards close to his vest. It is evident now that there was no written program for his government. He reserved the right to make final decisions in disputes between ministers, and he did not want his hands tied by policy blueprints.

Sarney, 54, a former senator and state governor from Brazil’s impoverished Northeast, lacks the public popularity that Neves enjoyed as a symbol of the restoration of democracy after 21 years of authoritarian military rule. Until last year, Sarney was president of the Social Democratic Party, and he became Neves’ running mate only after the party split over the choice of a presidential candidate.

Advertisement

For three weeks, Sarney has hesitated to assume much more than a figurehead role as Neves’ temporary successor. But the need for leadership in a government that is facing serious domestic and foreign problems is pushing Sarney toward a more active role.

In a move to generate popular support, Sarney announced that he wants to undertake “impact programs” that will provide makework jobs for the unemployed in rural areas, improve the distribution of food through government programs to the hungry and expand health services, particularly to mothers and infants.

This is a different order of priorities from those set by Neves in instructions he sent to the first Cabinet meeting from his hospital bed, three days after his first operation. He then ruled out “impact programs” involving unfinanced spending and called for economies and cuts in government spending to reduce inflation.

The consumer price index rose 12.7% in March, with accumulated inflation in the last 12 months of more than 230%. The government has ordered a price freeze for a month and is taking measures to bring the rate of price increases down this month to between 8% and 9%.

The anti-inflation priority is defended by Finance Minister Francisco Dornelles, who has been director of the federal tax department for seven years. His power in the Cabinet was based on his close relationship to Neves, who is his uncle.

The pressure for social spending is supported in the Cabinet by Planning Minister Joao Sayad and Labor Minister Almir Pazzianotto, both of whom are close to the congressional leadership of the Brazilian Democratic Movement. The largest party in the Neves coalition, it contains strong currents that put social spending ahead of anti-inflationary austerity.

Advertisement

Pazzianotto, a labor lawyer, has been negotiating for two weeks to avoid major strikes by automotive workers, port workers and other key sectors of labor, including bus drivers, who paralyzed the federal capital, Brasilia, for two days last week.

Dornelles and Antonio Carlos Lemgruber, the new president of the Central Bank, want a conservative wage policy that will be acceptable to the International Monetary Fund and foreign bankers who are concerned about collecting on Brazil’s $100-billion foreign debt. But Sarney and the ministers who support a more active social program are in favor of moderate wage increases. The issue must be decided by May 1, when a new national minimum wage is to be announced.

The expectation was that Neves, enjoying wide popular support and the confidence of the business sector, would have exercised strong leadership over the Cabinet in resolving these disputes.

Advertisement