Brazil - February 28th, 2022

With the electoral trap of Wall Street and the FIESP they seek to take the struggle of the working class out of the streets and be able to deepen the imperialist plan to colonize Brazil...

 Supported by the PT, the sellout bureaucracy of the CUT and the reformist left that support the candidacy of Lula-Alckmin...

 Lula-Alckmin: a candidacy to submit the exploited to their executioners

 Stop tying workers to slaveowner bosses who paint themselves as "progressive"!

 DOWN WITH THE ELECTORAL TRAP!

To defeat Bolsonaro:

 We must break the submission to the capitalists and prepare and organize the General Strike

 Congress of rank-and-file delegates from all trade union centrals, the unemployed, the homeless movement and the landless

 2022 marked the beginning of the fourth and last year of the Bolsonaro government which, yesterday under the command of Trump and today under the command of Biden, strictly applies the plan of Wall Street, the IMF and all the transnationals that plunder Brazil and the Mercosur.  The balance is visible: 30 million unemployed, more than 15 million chronically unemployed, advances in the labor and pension reform with a huge reduction both in labor conquests and work agreements, in addition to the more than 640 thousand deaths from COVID-19 in less than 2 years.  Add to this an unbearable famine, millions of newly exploited living on the streets with their families, mass murder of landless peasants in the countryside and exploited blacks in the city.  This is apart from the hundreds of deaths due to the floods as a result of the subhuman living conditions, as we could see in the avalanches in Greater São Paulo and now in Petrópolis, Rio de Janeiro, that have caused hundreds of deaths and disappearances! A true massacre of the exploited of the hills and in the city favelas all over the country!  While the 4 largest private banks in Brazil profited billions of dollars accounting for a 32% increase in 2021!

Who held the whip for Bolsonaro to enter his fourth year of government, though with each passing day the hatred of the exploited against him grew and they opened a path of struggle and resistance that was partially diminished by the COVID-19 pandemic?  They were Lula, the PT and the bureaucracies of the CUT, CTB, FS, etc.,  who have focused their policy on "removing Bolsonaro with the October elections."  In other words, they say Bolsonaro must be tolerated until December 31, while they support as a whole each and every one of the attacks, including voting all the laws in the parliaments and applying them in the governorates.  Or does anyone doubt that everywhere the PT governs, as in Bahia, or the PCdoB does, as in Maranhão, the same attacks took place as in Rio de Janeiro and São Paulo?

Why did the Bolsonaro attack happen?  Because Lula, the PT and the sellout bureaucracy dedicated themselves fervently to surrounding and defeating every decisive mass action, so that they do not wipe out Bolsonaro and his entire government, in order to protect the interests of all the capitalists and Wall Street's.

 The Bolsonaro government, even at the peak of the pandemic in mid-2020, faced more than 600 strikes.  So who was that didn't fight Bolsonaro?  The PT and the sellout bureaucracy of the CUT, FS, CTB, etc., which diverted the struggle of the exploited by setting up an enormous front of class collaboration and which today takes the form of the Lula-Alckmin formula, with which they bind, once again, the working class to its bourgeois executioners, which they have dressed as "progressive".

 You have to tell the truth!  The exploited did not stop fighting!  It was the union bureaucracy that isolated their fights sector by sector, city by city and factory by factory.  And today, far from Bolsonaro falling by the action in the streets, they are deploying the electoral trap at full speed.

 Today's PT is once more nothing new under the sun.  In 2002 and 2006 the formula was Lula-Alencar, then came the two governments of Dilma-Temer, in 2010 and 2014. Now this policy of class collaboration is crowned with the alliance with the Tucanos (politicians of the São Paulo bourgeoisie), the FIESP, a man absolutely trusted by Opus Dei and Wall Street: Geraldo Alckmin.

The working class and the exploited confronted the plan of imperialism and the Bolsonaro government was increasingly discredited.  The bourgeoisie fears an uprising of the masses to be oncoming in the face of unprecedented hardships for getting work, bread, land and a decent life, which would put at risk not only Bolsonaro but also all capitalists.  Imperialism sees the application of its plan in danger with the re-election of Bolsonaro and so it puts into action a new class-collaboration front government, once again applying what Stalinism in the 1930s called the Popular Front and which today  the entire New Left still maintains.

 This is the plan of Wall Street in the US backyard: To erect, in the face of the revolutionary uprisings of the masses, governments of class collaboration as in Chile, Peru, Bolivia, Ecuador, and as they are now trying to do in Colombia and Brazil.  In Brazil they call the PT, which has already ruled for 13 years, and in particular its agent Lula, who has already been disciplined with jail and today the same justice archives his process to be a candidate in the October elections, to let Bolsonaro complete his mandate. Together with Alckmin, Lula is to advance in applying the imperialist plan to colonize Brazil.
They are building a variant of class collaboration for Brazil in order to govern, to act again under the “Social Pact” regime with their CUT, FS, CTB, etc.  This determines that the sellout bureaucracy will enter the government with the bourgeoisie, tightly nationalizing the unions and applying bosses' terror in the factories.  Lula and the assassin Alckmin are not friends of the people, contrariwise, as we have already seen with Boris in Chile or with Castillo in Peru, they will not hesitate to use the repressive forces of the police and even the Armed Forces to crush the uprisings for bread in their countries and at their borders.

The PSOL at the feet of the PT, supporting the class collaboration strategy

 Imperialism and the bourgeoisie decided that, in the face of a Bolsonaro hated by the masses, it is necessary to advance in the replacement via elections and not with an Impeachment.  Actually it is about preventing the masses from defeating him in the streets and opening the way to the workers' and socialist revolution, following the wildfire of the revolutionary wave that shook South America together with the exploited black Americans and Cubans.

 The bourgeoisie and imperialism defined that would happen via the elections and with the Lula-Alckmin formula.  And this is the policy defended by the majority that supports Lula's candidacy in the PSOL:

 The PSOL presented, at a press conference on February 16, in the Chamber of Deputies, its platform "Right to the Future."  Attending were: for the majority wing of PSOL, Juliano Medeiros, president of the party, Guilherme Boulos (the "heir", according to Lula), Federal Deputy Talíria, both majority wing of PSOL; and Federal Deputy Samia Bomfim, president of the parliamentary caucus of the PSOL and part of the minority wing of the PSOL with the MES (Movimento de Esquerda Socialista).

In this conference they presented what they had previously announced: “The three main programmatic items approved as a base to the negotiations with the PT and the support for Lula's candidacy…”.  Said platform determines “… the revocation of the measures implemented after the 2016 coup (Labor Reform, Pension Reform and Expenditure Ceiling);  confronting the climate crisis (...) guarantee of rights to indigenous, traditional and quilombola (all-negro communities stablished in the forests by runaway slaves in the 18th-19th centuries, NT) peoples;  and the proposal for a tax reform that lowers the rates on the consumption of essential and popular goods and focuses the rate on income and property, including the creation of taxes on the super-rich/billionaires.”  (“Direct to Future: PSOL launches platform...”, 02-16-2022, psol50.org.br)

 These would be the three axes of the PSOL proposal, which they determine as "dialogue for the unity of the left" and as the main kick to discuss it, particularly with Lula, for whom they have already determined their support in the next presidential candidacy.  In other words, in a meeting with Lula and a PSOL delegation made up of Boulos, Medeiros and Talíria, they will discuss how they will carry out a joint campaign, what even includes not presenting their own candidates for president and defining other alliances in the governorates and parliaments.

 That is to say, the PSOL is not only preparing to defend and call for a vote for the Lula-Alckmin candidacy, but it is also preparing for alliances that do not rule out that they form part of this government, that is, they are preparing as their Podemos bosses are already doing. in the Spanish State, to join the regime and the government.

 For its part, the Resistencia current (Valerio Arcary's current that broke with the PSTU in 2016), an ally of Juliano Medeiros, is in favor of defeating Bolsonaro with the PSOL's support for Lula, they say: "Lula Yes, but Alckmin, No." .  To then propose 9 programmatic points for the debate on the left and in the PSOL "in defense of a government of the workers' organizations, without bosses", while they silence that it was the PT, the CUT, Fuerza Sindical, etc., together with the PT , who guaranteed labor reform under the Bolsonaro government.

 Consequently, the MES, of Samia Bomfim, that is, the current of Pedro Fuentes, spokesperson for Sanders in the PSOL, located from the minority that defends an "independent candidacy of the PSOL", affirm: "the need for an independent voice in the first round”, adding that it is necessary to “present in the election a dissonant voice to Bolsonarism and the policy of national unity that Lula articulates with the bourgeoisie.”  (Lula articulates..., 02-03-2022, movimentorevista.com.br).  In other words, the MES applies the same policy as in the US, first with Sanders (the "socialist" of the US imperialists' Democratic Party) and then handing everything over to Biden in the second round.  This in Brazil means in the first round “Independent candidacy”, in the second round “Everyone against Bolsonaro, vote Lula-Alckmin”.

Everything is clear, the PSOL, as a staunch defender of the bourgeois regime of the 1988 Constitution, is now preparing to take another step in its assimilation into the regime.  Everyone says that Bolsonaro will be kicked out with the October elections.  The bureaucracy of the CUT, FS, CTB, etc.  He said that "there was no other alternative than to give in" and he imposed it as a blackmail in the factories, applying the bosses' terror, surrendering everything at every step with the promise of "keeping the job";  reformism will say that the workers "are behind in their conscience and do not want to fight";  The majority of the PSOL, with Boulos and Juliano Medeiros at the head, would say that they are a direct reflection of the "coup against Dilma in 2016" and that it must be reversed with "a government of Lula and the progressive bourgeoisies."

 That is to say, they all come together at one point... It is with the electoral trap that the path is paved for Lula-Alckmin to impose the imperialist plan and the PSOL is ready to support it.  But the most terrible thing is that this means that the working class and the exploited have to tighten their belts, wait for the October elections and endure until 2023 when Lula-Alckmin takes office and they agree to apply the demands of the PSOL.

 To defeat Bolsonaro, we have to break the submission to Lula-Alckmin

 An independent workers' strategy is necessary to win

 It is necessary to prepare the conditions to put the working class on the offensive and defeat the hated Bolsonaro government and the entire infamous regime, opening the way to revolution.  As we can see, the reformist left tells us that "to defeat Bolsonaro you have to support Lula-Alckmin", thus tying the exploited to their executioners.  In reality, it is quite the opposite. To defeat Bolsonaro, it is necessary to guarantee that the working class and the exploited break the ties imposed by the treacherous leaderships, tying them to Lula-Alckmin.

Thus we see the other half of the left in Brazil behind the banner of "Presenting Independent Socialist Candidates of the PT."  This wing is made up of the PSOL minority, which represents 43% of the party, including the CST (Socialist Workers' Current/UIT-ci), the MES, LS (Socialist Struggle) and other minority currents.  At the head of this campaign and opening their tickets for this candidacy to materialize, is the PSTU (Current of the LIT-ci).  Together with the CST (Socialist Left in Argentina) and the MRT (PTS in Argentina), they proclaim the establishment of a Left Front as in Argentina, that is, a Brazilian FIT.

 Thus, they have set up a political regrouping under the name of "Socialist and Revolutionary Pole", in which they correctly determine the need to defeat the Bolsonaro government with actions in the streets.  But they have mainly focused their policy on the need to build a FIT in Brazil, that is, an electoral front that presents an independent ocandidate, but within the margins of the electoral trap.  Let's see:

 Precisely what the exploited need is not a Socialist candidacy per se, although it can be used as a tribune to agitate massively in the electoral situation, but rather it is about fighting to set up an independent workers' strategy.  A Socialist and Revolutionary Pole should be a means to build the fighting organizations of the working class at the height of the war that the slave owners and the Bolsonaro government have launched against us.
To advance along this path, it is necessary, in the first place, to fight for the working class to break with the Lula-Alckmin Front and prepare to defeat all the exploiters, preventing any progress in their imposing the electoral trap.

 The conditions clearly show that before the Brazilian working class the conditions are red hot –like yesterday they were in Colombia, Chile, Bolivia, Peru, USA, etc.– for fighting in the streets and bring down the Bolsonaro government and the entire infamous regime. That is why, in order to defeat imperialism and Bolsonaro, it is necessary to prevent the deadly traps of the elections and the submission to Lula-Alckmin from being imposed.  Clearly, the exit will not be attained by voting for Lula-Alckmin, just as it was not a class exit to vote for Haddad-D'Ávila in the second round against Bolsonaro in 2018.

 This is the policy they applied yesterday by voting for the Castillos and their bourgeois party in Peru and for the Borics and their front with the bourgeoisie of the Christian Democracy in Chile, as promoted by the PSTU, the CST and the PSOL as a whole.  There the working class set up its organizations to fight, but thanks to the fact that their leaderships diverted them from their combat, subjected them to the electoral trap and placed them at the feet of the "democratic" bourgeoisie, weakening all their strength.  The consequences, as we have already said, are in sight, with the "progressive" governments of Boric and Castillo using repressive forces and even the Armed Forces to repress the exploited who fight for bread in these countries and those who crowd on its borders, like the hungry Venezuelan migrants.  Drawing these conclusions from the recent experiences is that it will be possible to advance so that a Pole that fights for Socialism and the Revolution can truly be built.

 What is striking is that although Lula-Alckmin lead the polls for the presidential elections in October, it is already clear that it will go to a second round, and this would put Lula-Alckmin against Bolsonaro.

 This determines that no organization that prides itself on being combative, independent and struggling for the  exploited's cause can give even the slightest support to the Lula-Alckmin candidacy, neither in the first nor in the second round.  This should be the first motion to the entire labor movement and its fighting organizations, in order to set up a Pole to fight for true class independence and uniting the ranks of the workers and the exploited.  The thing is, it won't do any good if a "Socialist and revolutionary Pole" is set up that claims to fight against class collaboration, if in the second round the working class is called to vote for its "democratic" executioners.

But it will be much less useful if this Pole only determines to build an electoral Left Front, because what is it to be done until October?  It is not about organizing a socialist candidacy, an independent workers' strategy is necessary to win.

 We must defeat the sellout bureaucracy of the CUT, FS, CTB, etc.!  It is about fighting at the base of these trade union centrals to break the submission to the Lula-Alckmin candidacy.  In this way, it will be possible to fight to set up, with delegates from all the factories and establishments, the workers' and popular committees and strike commands centralized by neighborhood, region, state and at the national level.  It is necessary to unite the ranks of the workers, the effective and outsourced workers, the underemployed and the unemployed, to fight as one fist against the capitalists!

 From the CSP-Conlutas, the fight should be led in the entire labor movement and the vanguard to launch a war without quarter against the capitalists, defining the unity of the working class and the exploited in a Congress of grassroots delegates from all the trade unionis, the unemployed, the landless and the homeless, to fight for the revolutionary General Strike, which puts its foot on the chest of the IMF, the transnationals, Bolsonaro and all the slave owners.

 The capitalists have already stolen too much from us and they come for everything, that is why they will not hesitate to deepen the repression, the persecution and even the murder of all those who dare to fight in the streets for bread, work, land and a decent life.  It is time for self-defense committees to be built to defend themselves against Bolsonaro's fascist police.

 The last word has not yet been said.  Enough of submitting to Lula-Alckmin!  Like in 2013 THEY DON'T REPRESENT US!  The powerful Brazilian working class is destined to play a decisive historical role in the struggle of the masses of the American continent to shake off the subjugation and plunder of imperialism.

 History is going to be written by the class struggle, which will be stronger than any apparatus and will give Trotskyists and revolutionaries a thousand opportunities to regroup their forces.

Comité Revolucionario Obrero y Juvenil por la Autoorganización (Revolutionary Workers and Youth Committee for Self-Organization)
 (CROJA)