The SACP is outraged by the coup in Brazil
5 September 2016
The South African Communist Party (SACP) is outraged by the constitutional coup that has just been carried out in Brazil through the manipulation of the Senate leading to the impeachment of the democratically elected President Dilma Rousseff. We express our full solidarity with all progressive forces in Brazil in the struggle against corporate capture and imperialist manipulation to shift power to rightwing forces opposed to democratic social transformation inclusive of economic transformation.
On Wednesday 31 August, 61 men in Brazil’s 81-member Senate, and many of them facing serious corruption charges, carried out a constitutional coup that effectively tossed away the 54 million votes democratically won in the 2014 Brazilian Presidential election by the now ousted President Dilma Rousseff. This isolation of the masses, amounting to an assault on democracy, took place in the context.
Meanwhile, various strata of the capitalist class – both internal and internationalised – with political and external connections respectively in institutions of power in Brazil such as the Senate as shown in this case and in the United States and Western European imperialist axis were actively involved behind the coup.
The fight came out in the open after a far reaching two-year investigation into billions of dollars dispensed in bribery at the state owned oil company Petrobras. A number of high ranking businesspeople and politicians were arrested, convicted and imprisoned as a result of the investigation that threatened many of the Senators who ousted Rousseff under the guise of impeachment.
Rousseff was suspended by those who propagated her removal in May alleging that she manipulated state accounts to portray a sunshine financial position. The Senators who conspired to remove her, particularly those who are facing corruption charges, ignored evidence and reports against the allegation because they were not interested in anything else other than saving their own skins.
The developments in Brazil must not be viewed in isolation from the broader imperialist strategy of regime change. The Brics group of countries – Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa – have experienced increased imperialist aggression pushing for a shift to the right after the group announced final plans to implement the formation of the Brics Bank or the New Development Bank that many in Western financial circles view as a threat to their monopoly. The aggression range from sanctions imposed under different pretexts, such as in the case of Russia, and the application of various forms of so-called soft power involving local collaborators and imperialist funded groupings operating some of them in the name of “civil society”.
Issued by Alex Mohubetswane Mashilo, National Spokesperson, SACP, 5 September 2016
