Dilma the Amazon of the Planalto Part II: The Fall.

 

On November 9, 2014 this blogger posted an article entitled The Amazon of the Planalto (http://wikibea-carioca.blogspot.com.br/2014/11/the-amazon-of-planalto.html) to introduce Dilma Rousseff and explain why she had been re-elected president of Brazil. In 2016, Dilma has become a household name even outside Brazil, and for many Brazilians, the Planalto looks more like a den of crooks than a presidential palace. The president’s falling from grace has been swift and spectacular. Why have things gone so wrong for Dilma?

Dilma is the most unpopular president since the restoration of democracy in 1985. In order to be re-elected, she painted a rosy picture of the economy and spent public money outrageously. In order to hide the abysmal budget deficit, she cooked the books. Re-elected, she had to renege on her campaign promises to fix the runaway deficit. She is squarely responsible for the worse economic recession in 80 years. Now, she is being impeached for falsifying government accounts. In addition, a majority of Brazilians believe that she condoned political corruption mainly the leviathan-size embezzlement of the state oil company Petrobras to protect members of her party and its coalition. This blogger believes that the impeachment is a constitutional trick aimed at a weary president whose government’s survival depends on unconstitutional budget tricks. In fact, the impeachment is a referendum on her helpless, hopeless and incompetent government.

In my previous blog, I portrayed Dilma as a very un-Brazilian person for being rude, bossy and aloof. This is what I wrote: “For many, Dilma is Brazilian version of the Iron Lady of the United Kingdom. For this blogger she is more Iron than Lady. She comes across as stiff, authoritarian, uncharismatic, controlling, rude, and uncaring. She is said to run her cabinet like a boot camp. She does not loosen up even when surrounded by her adoring fans. In a country renowned for its congeniality, she is seen as a loner. Dilma leaves no one indifferent. For her leftist Workers’ Party sympathizers and the impoverished northerners she is an icon, the Madonna of the poor, uniquely gifted to make Brazil advance toward social justice. However, for the 51 million who did not vote for her, she is like the cartoon character Cruella de Vil, a hypocrite who protects a criminal organization”.

Thanks to its efficient propaganda, the Worker Party (PT in Portuguese) has proclaimed itself the only champion of democracy and social justice. According to PT, attacking Dilma equates to a coup attempt against democracy and the poor. The coup mongers are the right wing elite, and the media who want to take their revenge over the PT’s loathed progressive social agenda. In April 2016, Dilma’s backers, mainly trade unionists, intellectuals, public servants and artists made a show of support. However, her confrontational style has antagonized many allied politicians and PT members. Party’s big wigs and left leaning political allies are less supportive of her, therefore they denounced the impeachment as a coup d’état against the institutions. This rhetoric is someway validated by the fact that a large number of the lower-house politicians who voted Dilma down, have a very tarnished reputation. Some sixty of them are under investigation for corruption or more serious crimes!

The last paragraph of my 2014 blog was prophetic, I implied that Dilma will have to update her guerrilla skills to keep the alpha males of her cabinet in line. Her relationship with her vice-president Michel Temer (75) was notoriously strained, and she hardly consulted him about state matters. He complained of being a “decorative vice-president” and being treated with mistrust and contempt. In 2016, the veep and most of her ministers have either abandoned or confronted her. Temer has been instrumental in Dilma’s downfall, acting quietly to undermine her in the wings: “Revenge is a dish best eaten cold” according to the saying,

                 

                                       Dilma and Michel in happier times

Currently, the impeachment process follows its long-winded course in the Senate. Very probably, Dilma will have to step aside for 180 days, and the all-boy-club of the old guard will take over.

This blogger never liked Dilma’s unorthodox economic maneuvers, but she was a bulwark against the conservative and patriarchal social agenda of the boys of the old guard. With Dilma in the dog house, the vice-president will take charge of an interim government. Under investigation for bribe taking, Temer is also very unpopular. He will eject PT members, nominate his own cronies and reward pro-impeachment political parties. He hopes to revive the economy by going back to orthodoxy. However, worryingly for this blogger, he is under the influence of the old patriarchal elite and the Evangelical Christians whose political clout is growing in Brazil. Their dream is to make Brazil an Iran-styled theocracy. Now, Temer is assembling his all-male, all-white cabinet under the blessing of leading Evangelical politicians. His task is nearly impossible as Brazil has no less than 32 registered political parties whose only goal is seeking patronage.

Dilma’s social views are very liberal and in line with the tolerant social mores of the majority of Brazilians. She never hid her atheist belief, resisted the moral agenda of the conservative political parties backed by Catholic and Evangelical Christians, and was an advocate of the laicity of the state. Dilma was committed to advancing women’s rights and in a country where abortion is highly restricted she was publicly pro-choice. She took a stand for the criminalization of homophobia and her party blocked several attempts to pass laws to allow psychiatrists to treat homosexuality as a disease or a mental disorder (cura gay in Portuguese).

In a patronage-ridden political system, Temer’s selection of potential ministers is already under fire. Particularly worrying is Temer’s choice for minister of science and technology; it may go to a bishop from the Evangelical Universal Church who is promoting creationist theories.

Even the supporters of economic orthodoxy may miss Dilma’s wretched government.

The Many Assassinations of Leon Trotsky

 

According to Google, some 160 books have been written on Trotsky’s assassination in Mexico on August 21, 1940. Assassins receive much less scholarly attention; very few books are dedicated to them. A recent exception is the investigative cum historic novel The Man Who Loved Dogs written in 2009 by Cuban novelist Leonardo Padura. The dog lover is Ramón Mercader del Rio[1] (1913-1978), Leon Trotsky’s icepick holding assassin.

            

                         Hunter                                                   Prey: Portrait by Frida Kahlo

Friends had encouraged me to read the book, but it took me a while to open this brick of a book. I do not particularly like dogs, and with the demise of the Soviet Union, Trotsky’s wandering and assassination did not titillate my interest. My curiosity got piqued after seeing an exhibition on the life and art of Mexican surrealist artist Frida Kahlo. In 1936, Frida and her muralist husband, Diego Rivera welcomed Trotsky to their home in Coyoacán and eventually to her bed. My Spanish is small talk level and reading in the original Cuban-Spanish was unachievable. I spent the month of March reading the 700 plus-pages French translation. The English translation is only 576 pages long!

Padura’s novel reads like a multilayered thriller organized around the two main characters, Trotsky and Mercader. Trotsky, a modern wandering Jew forced into exile by his nemesis Stalin, had been Lenin’s comrade and founder of the Red Army. Mercader, a young Catalan Republican and Communism aficionado was recruited and trained by Stalin’s NKVD/GPU[2] goons. Prey and hunter were Communist reincarnations of Faust, whose lives no longer belonged to them, they were the living dead.

There is a third person, the fictitious Iván Cárdenas, a failed and despondent Cuban novelist whose inspiration was cut short by Fidel Castro’s censorship. Cárdenas’ fortuitous beach encounter with Mercader (under an alias) makes him the unwilling depository of the unfolding drama. His miserable life is particularly poignant and Padura sheds a fascinating light on Cuba’s tortuous and dehumanized brand of Communism. It is their love of dogs that connects Mercader to Cárdenas. Actually, the book’s title is misleading: According to Padura, all three main characters were dog lovers! Dogs have very often been the accessories of tyrants and blood thirsty dictators.

For me, the book’s main interest lies in its focus on the emotional and psychological traits rather than the historic dimension of both hunter and prey. However, Padura’s comprehensive research and access to previously secret files give a historical appeal to the storytelling. To remain politically relevant during his exile, Trotsky obsessively promoted his brand of international Marxism and tried to demonize Stalin’s ideological deviation. With the dwindling number of followers, his political legacy became his fundamental concern. His love of dogs apart, Trotsky comes across as a vain, self-centered and callous individual.

Trotsky received political asylum from several countries, France included. My curiosity was piqued when I found out that I might have walked by his former house in Saint Palais-sur-Mer near the seaside town of Royan. My mother who lived in Saint Palais for decades never mentioned its accidental but illustrious guest. Recently, a friend informed me that the Villa les Embruns (Sea Spray) had been demolished in 1945, possibly as a collateral damage of the Allies’ air raids against the Nazis’ stronghold of Royan.

       

  Villa Sea Spray, father & son                    Ménage à trois: Natalia, Frida & Leon

On the other hand, when in Mexico City, I visited Diego and Frida’s Casa Azul, (Blue House). Leon Trotsky and his wife Natalia were rent-free guests for nearly two years until Trotsky’s affair with Frida forced the couple to move out and set up their own home. I find the episode quietly ironical, for Frida extramarital sex was a liberation from bourgeois values, but for a true Marxist like Trotsky, adultery was a bourgeois sin. As a result, cuckooed Diego Rivera decided that he was no longer a Trotskyite. He nonetheless continued in his macho ways, enjoying extramarital flings, in particular with Frida’s sister. On the sly, Frida did the same with men and women. Mercader was once invited for dinner in her house.

Little is known about Mercader and his many aliases, he is a personage de l’ombre, (a shadow person). In the book, he is more a fictional than historical character. After the assassination, he was jailed for 20 years. In 1961, he was shipped to Moscow, where he spent another 20 years in Soviet comfort but without much freedom. The last two years of his life were spent in Cuba. Mercader comes across as a puppet driven by hate and fear, a willing and cynical executioner who sometimes looks almost robotic. It is amazing that he survived the convolutions and palace coups of the Soviet Union until 1978. His rapport with the other characters of the plot makes him psychologically interesting. Mercader displays a filial devotion to his wily NKVD handler, the operative Nahum Eitington (1899-1981), who cunningly morphed into the father figure he missed in his youth. In the book, and possibly in life, Mercader is surrounded by strong-willed women, and his rapport with them is complex, unfulfilled and strained. A fanatic Stalinist, his Spanish mother Caridad[3] del Rio was both Eitington’s mistress and partner in crime. Fully aware of the risk to her son’s life, she nonetheless convinced him to kill Trotsky. Mercader’s love hate relationship with his mother could have been Oedipal.

According to Padura, África de las Heras (1909-1988) was Mercader’s great and frustrated love. She was ideologically close to Caridad who recruited her on behalf of the NKVD. Caridad and África were involved in Trotsky’s murder. During WW II, África started a successful international career as a spy for the KGB.

And there is the unfortunate Sylvia Ageloff (1910-1995) a devoted American Trotskyist who accidentally provided Mercader access to her hero’s home. She had been selected by Eitington as the perfect cats’paw. Lonesome, plain looking with thick glasses, she was easily seduced by Mercader who treated her with derision and contempt. Unfairly, Paduro makes an unflattering portrait of Sylvia Ageloff. Is it for the sake of fiction or evidence of Cuban machismo?

Trotsky was assassinated again in 1972 by bad boy actor Alain Delon who impersonated Mercader in Joseph Losey’s odd ball film The Assassination of Trotsky. Richard Burton played Trotsky and Romy Schneider was Ageloff under the pseudonym of Gita, as the genuine one was still alive in New York City. The film bombed at the box office and can be seen on YouTube. Trotsky will be assassinated again in 2016, in a Mexican film still in production. Retrospectively, Trotsky achieved his goal of not being forgotten.

           

     Richard Burton as Trotsky                          Delon and Burton: Murder scene

Mercader died in Havana, seemingly of cancer after a long illness. Padura hints that his own people may “have released radioactivity in his blood” to kill him slowly. A dry run for many more Soviet-styled executions. The Soviet Union no longer exists, but the signature executions go on.

 

---

[1] Also known as Jacques Monard, Frank Jacson & Ramon Ivanovich Lopez.

[2] NKVD: People’s Commissariat for Internal affairs. GPU: State Political Directorate.

[3] A misnomer as Caridad is Spanish for charity.

The lifestyle of a rich and famous populist: Lula’s case study.

 

Under this heading, two men are top stories these days, The Donald (Trump) in the USA and Lula (also known as Luis Inácio Lula da Silva) in Brazil. They share some personal attributes, both are rabble rousers and enjoy a tacky lifestyle. The first one is a right wing populist who lives off his personal fortune while the second is a left wing former president who lives off his rich friends’ kindness.

Next year, the USA may swear in its first populist president; on the other hand, Latin America has perfected the formula. In 2016, the majority of its leaders are dye in-the-wool leftwing populists. Among them, Lula who was president for eight years has reached mythical status, primus inter pares. Like his clone, the late president Chávez of Venezuela, Lula is a very divisive figure: he is the most loved and the most hated man in Brazil. Now, he is certainly first among equals in matters of political trickeries and obstruction of justice. Although an early admirer, this blogger is no longer a total fan. His fall from grace was faster than his spectacular rise in national politics.

In 2016, Lula stands accused of money laundering in the context of the Petrobras mega- embezzlement scandal investigated by operation Car Wash, influence peddling with construction companies, illicit self-enrichment, concealing property ownership and possibly obstruction of justice. His wealth is estimated at US$ 8 million, and one of his sons is amongst the richest man of Brazil. To add insult to injury, the current president Dilma Rousseff named him Chief-of-staff, a job which shields him from possible prosecution.

                            

                                                      Lula before

Lula comes from an under-privileged background from the poverty-stricken North East of Brazil. He worked as a metal worker in São Paulo, and has been a political fixture since the 1970s when as a trade unionist, he stood up to the military regime. After two attempts, he was finally elected president in 2003, and left the office after two terms at the end of 2010. As president, he put aside his left-wing rhetoric. Benefitting from the commodity boom, Lula led Brazil through years of mega investments. He was a successful president albeit a lucky one. He used the windfall to pull millions of people out of poverty through steady economic growth and money transfers to the most marginalized ones in his native Northeast. However, he failed to reform Brazil’s outdated institutions which would have allowed the country to weather leaner years like now.

When Lula left the presidency, he was legitimately a man with a high middle class standard of living; he had substantial savings and enjoyed many generous retirement pensions. When in office, a president hardly spends anything; Lula had no lawyers to pay like Bill Clinton, another rags-to-rich president, nor gave 90 percent of his salary to charity like José Mujica, the former president of Uruguay who qualifies as the world’s “humblest” of president.

However upon leaving Brasilia, Lula told his adoring supporters that “I am leaving government to live life on the streets where I always was, I will be more of the people than ever before”. Instead of enjoying his new status of a respected self-made man, Lula was longing for his previous life of hardship. He wanted people to believe that in spite of eight years in the presidential palace and a successful career, he had not changed and remained true to his poor man’s values. He even bragged that he had never opened a book in his life. On the other hand, the millions of people who had benefitted from the economic growth where unabashedly busy improving their lots and sending their kids to better schools. For this blogger, through the above statement, Lula planted the seeds of trouble to come.

Emulating many of his peers, the former president started a lucrative career of international lecturer. Charging speaking fees in the order of US$ 100,000.00, Lula delivered hundreds of lectures, mostly in Latin America and Africa. Nothing illegal at this stage. However, these lectures were overwhelmingly paid by business corporations, and many are implicated in the Car Wash Operation. Construction companies not only funded Lula’s conference trips and lectures but also made hefty donation to his foundation in São Paulo (Instituto Lula). Interestingly, the Lula Institute does not post these lectures on line; recently a famous judge wondered whether they actually existed. For a period, Lula was under contract with the New York Times to write opinion columns. During his international trips, Lula has been portrayed as a lobbyist or middle man for Brazilian construction firms. According to the Brazilian media, in 2015 these companies had about US$ 5 billion worth of contracts with the Federal Government. Lula’s close ties with these firms have tarnished his former statesman aura.

                            

                                                        Lula now

With so much money coming his way, Lula faced an existential dilemma. True to his word as a poor man, he could not exhibit a flashy lifestyle. Even the Car Wash sleuths have a hard time following Lula’s money trail; they nonetheless claim that there is evidence that the former president received real estate and money gifts from firms implicated in Petrobras bribery scheme. Lula is linked to a beach front three-story penthouse and to a sprawling country estate with swimming pool and lake. The police believes they were given to him in a “scratch-my-back” type of scheme because Lula’s personal items were found in these places.

                     

                                 Country estate in a shitty location..

The ex-president claims that he owns nothing, and that, he and his family only visited these residences as guests. One knows that Lula lives with his wife in his former apartment in suburban São Paulo, where he owes three apartments. The apartment next to his is empty and someone pays the rent, but who? Facts remain fuzzy regarding Lula’s investments.

                        

                                        Lula: A poor man’s soul.

By Brazilian standards, these are far from being prime location real estates. It is hilarious to hear a released taped phone call whereby the mayor of Rio de Janeiro, an otherwise devoted fan of Lula tells him that “his farm house and penthouse are in shitty places, that Lula’s has never lost his poor man’s soul, and that it is the biggest fucking disgrace”. Lula seems to agree.

                   

                                       Lula and Dilma: Team Work.

Lula’s chief of staff nomination has been suspended by a Supreme Court judge. It is ironical to remember that in 1988, Lula allegedly said that when a poor man steals he goes to jail; but when a rich guy does the same, he get a ministerial job! At this stage of the game, the political crisis has reached such an unparalleled level of pandemonium and crassness that apparently the writers of the political series House of Cards are keenly following the plot’s twists and turns.

Brazilian Bribery Scandals for Dummies

A Swedish politician inadvertently uses her official credit card to have a haircut; she ruins her political career. A British lord spends his stipends on landscaping his garden or on prostitutes; national opprobrium forces him into exile in some backwater estate. A French minister lies about an insignificant secret Swiss bank account (€ 600,000); he is sacked and put on trial.

Conversely, when the Brazilian speaker of the Senate flew 2000 kilometers for free on an air force jet to have 10,000 hairs implanted he receives accolades from his peers. However, lambasted by the media, he grudgingly agreed to refund the state. Embroiled in another scandal, the serial offender was forced to step down. He has nonetheless been reelected speaker of the Senate. The speaker of the lower house of Congress one-ups him. He is accused of money laundering and of hoarding US$ 5 million of bribe money in several Swiss bank accounts. Undeterred, he made clear that he will not leave his post even if indicted. Bribe-taking seems to be in the majority of Brazilian politicians’ DNA. A former president, disgraced and impeached in the early 1990s, is now accused of taking a $ 1million bribe in the Petrolão, or Big Oil embezzlement scandal. And there is the case of Congressman Paulo Maluf, the poster boy for Brazil’s dysfunctional and flawed justice system. In the 1990s, when he was the mayor of São Paulo, he embezzled $ 300 million. He is an Interpol fugitive and France has in abstentia sentenced him to a three-year jail term for organized money laundering. Two years ago, he was reelected to Congress, thanks to his efficient vote buying structure.

The federal police enquiry, Operção Lava-Jato (Operation Car Wash) started innocuously enough about two and half years ago when it began investigating a money laundering scheme running in a chain of petrol stations. Now it had grown exponentially into a zillion dollar embezzlement scandal, and Brazil’s largest bribery and kickback scandal so far. The Petrolão corruption scheme is shaking the foundations of the state and that of Petrobras, the state-owned and publically-listed oil giant. Petrolão incriminates government officials, political parties and political leaders of the government coalition, large construction corporations, and middle men. The prosecutors are boldly casting a large net, implicating an increasing number of people, and uncovering additional but connected corruption cases.

Operation Car Wash with its cynical intrigue, star-powered cast and twist and turn plot is more exciting than even the most entertaining Brazilian telenovela, the celebrated soap operas. State-owned enterprises, particularly in the oil industry, are long-established government’s cash cows and piggy banks. What makes this scandal so infuriating is the mammoth amount of money embezzled from golden goose Petrobras by officials who are expected to be its guardian angels. Petrobras is a national icon and the outrage has been enormous in a population usually portrayed as corruption-blasé. Petrobras’ new management is said to have written down $2 billion for corruption cost. In 2015, the already very much in debt Petrobras may have lost up to $ 7 billion as a result of poor management and oversight, corruption, waste, and low oil prices. To the dismay of its shareholders, the company posted a 60% loss of market value.

How was Petrobras bled? Large construction companies agreed to pay bribes to get their hands on Petrobras’ juicy contracts. The bribes inflated the price of these million and billion dollar contracts by an estimated 3 percent. Moreover, to ensure that projects and bribes were evenly apportioned, contractors formed cartels between them. In the process, Petrobras was twice duped. Bribes are an inherent component of government’s infrastructure projects. In Petrolão, sleaze has a political dimension as most of the siphoned money ended up in the pockets of the government party and that of its coalition partners. The scheme was well lubricated thanks to the resourcefulness of the middle men who on behalf of Petrobras executives and their political benefactors, moved the money offshore to shell companies. The money then resurfaced into political campaign slush funds. Most of the money was disbursed during the 2014 campaign, and the left-over went towards funding the lavish lifestyle of political hacks.

The leftish Worker Party, whose acronym is PT in Portuguese, is the governing party. It was founded by the former president Lula da Silva (aka Lula) and the current president, Dilma Rousseff (aka Dilma) was handpicked by Lula. When Lula became president in 2003, the spoil system went into over-drive: the majority of executive and procurement positions in state-owned enterprises were gradually filled by party and government supporters. As technocrats were replaced by “yes” men, corruption intensified. It has now become endemic affecting all economic sectors. Under Lula’s presidency, nationalist fervor went as far as enacting a tough new national content legislation. Petrobras and other oil companies were required to purchase often shoddy and always overpriced Brazilian supplies and technology and use locally built shipyards. Worldwide, national content rules are regarded as conduit for corruption, and not surprisingly Brazil has finessed the scheme.

                  

                                      Partners in Sleaze?                                           

Operation Car Wash is bringing both surprises and dismay; its appendages are now reaching beyond Petrobras into, among others, the energy, banking, and agricultural sectors. The prosecutors have handed down many convictions, and leading political figures of the governing majority have been implicated but not yet charged (so far they are about fifty). They have reacted with indignation denying wrong doing. Until now, about two dozen individuals have been jailed. They include Petrobras executives and construction sector tycoons who have been perp walked to the delight of the public and the media. Brazilian jail facilities have convinced many to cooperate with the police to seek leniency through plea bargains. They are singing like Zé Carioca the street wise, dapper parrot of Disney cartoons, to expose politicians whose jail terms are eagerly awaited by the Brazilian people. Only the Federal Supreme Court (FSC) can issue arrest warrants to elected officials, so it is a slow, frustrating and tortuous process.

Actually, the FSC regards obstruction of justice with harshness and recently sent a ruling party senator and senate whip to jail along with a famous investment banker. This episode, related to Petrolão, took a page from the script of a bad telenovela. The pair was trying to bribe and spirit out of the country a key witness whose plea bargain could have implicated them. Both denied wrongdoing and have now been released. The senator was freed after agreeing to a plea bargain. However, the pair is not yet out of the woods.

         

                    Ze Carioca and imitator: who sings loudest?

Operation Car Wash may be the Federal police’s “piece of resistance”, but the cops are busy investigating other scandals, less hyped but just as damaging for the government. Operation Zelote stands out for the creativity of the probed corruption scheme. Members of a division of the tax department responsible for settling tax disputes with corporations were actually helping them to avoid taxes. The companies agreed to reward the corrupt bureaucrats with up to 10 percent of the money they saved through this arrangement. Interestingly, many of these companies are also implicated in the Petrobras case. It is estimated that over the last ten years the government lost a whopping $ 5.8 billion in tax revenue.

The Petrobras investigation has been going on for over two years; it is an increasingly complex and convoluted case and people tend to lose interest. However, Car Wash fatigue has not set in because every other week, the humdrum of the investigation is shaken by bombshell disclosures. The latest one is the arrest of Dilma’s campaign guru who allegedly overcharged Petrobras for work and distributed the excess money as kickbacks. Brazilian multinational Odebretch, the biggest construction company in Latin America, is in the spotlight for being involved in every scam. It has been identified by prosecutors as the money launderer-in-chief, giving bribes for business favors. Its cozy relationship with Lula is being scrutinized. The former president is now being investigated for influence-peddling on behalf of Odebrecht as well as bribe taking. The firm’s setbacks are not limited to Brazil. It is under investigation in Peru, Switzerland and in a couple of oil-producing African countries.

Petrobras is slowly returning to good health. People are eagerly waiting with for more arrests, hopefully closer to the center of power. The scandal is regarded a game-changer in Brazil, a country traditionally too complacent with grafts, swindlers and sleazy politicians. The economic downturn makes people less tolerant. Operation Car Wash may be a first step towards cleaning the Augean stables run by the scandal-ridden political elite, a self-entitled caste which until the Car Wash enquiry was a nexus of impunity beyond the reach of justice.

To the dismay of many politicians, and in spite of the spread of the zica virus, Operation Car Wash is still front page news. Nonetheless, politicians of all stripes rejoiced at a recent poll which indicated that Aedes aegypti, the multi-task mosquito, is Brazil’s enemy number one. Aedes aegypti would not have established its operation headquarters in Brazil if the country’s institutions had not been plundered by these criminal officials.

When not to visit Salta, Argentina

 

Carnival in Rio de Janeiro looks like great fun from the outside, but for those who have reached Carnival fatigue-like this blogger- it is better to abandon the city to its revelers. Rio hosts two separate carnival festivities: the extravagant four-night-long show of the well-established samba schools, and a two-week-long street carnival which attracts millions of rowdy people. The resulting gridlock is what many Cariocas who enjoy their carnivals in carefully chosen doses, try to escape. This year, many Cariocas also wanted to escape the bite of Aedes egypti the mosquito which spreads zica fever. The annual exodus benefits carnival-free locations. The city of Salta in the Andean part of Argentina looked like an attractive place for a five-day break; however it turned out to be not the ideal choice.

Visit of Salta la Linda.

The visit started with the run-of-the-mill city tour to get a feel for the geography. Two day-tours to discover Andean Argentina were also booked. Salta city is a bit of a tourist fraud, not as beautiful as its nickname implies. Promoted for its colonial heritage, it has little to show for its glorious past. Most of the old mansions have been replaced by non-descript buildings put up during the post WWI period when Argentina, as rich as the US, was booming by feeding beef to the world. The heart of city has retained its square block colonial plan but now shows a mishmash of ugly buildings. The few surviving 18^th century landmarks have undergone ugly post-earthquake reconstruction. Staying outside town in a charming finca, was a quaint choice but a logistical mistake: the excursions all depart from the city center, 40 minutes away. Doing some research for this blog, I discovered that the extended city tour had taken us to the remote and picturesque location of Taras Bulba, a Hollywood film (1962) starring Yul Brunner and Tony Curtis (so much for the Russian steppes!) Our young guide did not mention it: he probably never heard of Taras Bulba!

                  

         

                             Salta: The Cabildo on Carnival day (BL).

The must see Mummy museum.

Salta has many museums. One, the High Mountain Archeological Museum (MAAM), puts the city on the map. It was especially built to protect three mummies of children dating from the Inca civilization, 500 years ago. The very well preserved mummies were found during the 1999 scientific expedition to the volcano Llullaillaco on the Argentine-Chilean border, 400 kilometers west of Salta. The stratovolcano (6739 meters above sea level) is probably the highest active volcano in the world. It is now dormant, but geologists have identified evidence of late 19^th century lava activity. The Incas worshiped mountains as sacred places and many mummies have been found in high altitude sanctuaries. The children, two girls and a boy, were from noble families. They had been taken to the sacrificial site at an altitude of 6715 m, and made to drink chicha, a fermented maize alcohol. Drugged to stupor and unconsciousness, the three children look as if they are sleeping. They may not have been buried alive, but died of hypothermia.

                                 

                               The Maiden mummy: the 14 years old girl.

Only one mummy is exhibited at any given time. In February, the young boy was displayed in an acrylic cylinder at -20 degrees C. The museum also exhibits another mummy, no longer frozen named la Reina del Cerro, or the Queen of the Mountain. Unfortunately the queen was discovered by looters and not scientists in 1922. Various offerings were found in her tomb on Mount Chuscha (over 5300 m) south of Salta. Between 1922 and 2006, when it was given to the MAAM, the mummy had been unceremoniously bounced between different owners.

Checking landmarks.

This blogger travelled to Salta to discover the Humahuaca Quebrada and the colonial village of Cachi. The Humahuaca Quebrada is a narrow mountain valley over an altitude of 2000 m, a World Heritage site some 250 kms north of Salta. To get there and back took 15 hours! An agonizing slog which included a 45 minute loo stop at a gas station overwhelmed by tourist minibuses! Salta should be avoided during Carnival; this was a second mistake.

                                   Seven Color Hills in Purmamarca

Several villages along the valley were in an advanced stage of carnival madness, the result was a stop and go traffic. To make matter worse, a mud flow blocked the road to the village of Purmamarca, the most picturesque site of the region, famous for its Seven Color Hills. It was dark when we finally arrived at the village and too late to fully enjoy the valley’s colors.

     

                                      Purmamarca and Seven Color Hill.

Needless to say tempers flared in our minivan group. If the Argentines took it in stride, the foreigners were less forgiving. As you may know, I like to criticize, but this time I kept quiet, adopting a neutral position. To avoid such hassle, travel agencies should be more flexible and adapt their itinerary to the circumstances.

       

                                             Humahuaca Quebrada

The Salta region is either wet and lush or dry and parched. In the dry winter, the city is often plagued by nasty dust storms. Mistake number three was to visit Salta in summer during the rainy season, from December to March. Although it mostly rains at night (monstrous thunderstorms), mountain roads are often washed out in the morning.

        

                                                     After the rain

My other excursion was a 320 km long day trip to the colonial village of Cachi through landscapes of impressive beauty and diversity. The famed provincial road 33 is a scenic experience in itself. It snakes along hills covered by lush tropical vegetation (incidentally the road was blocked by a rock fall from the previous rainstorm and we had to drive along the muddy river bed instead!) then climbs the Obispo slope through bends and loops.

      

                                                     Obispo Slope

It finally reaches the Piedra del Molino at 3.620 meters above sea level. The road then drops 1000 meters and crosses Los Cardones National Park in the arid Argentine puna, the high plateaus of the Andes. Cardones cacti are the brothers of the Saguaros of the American West. Some are as old as 300 years and can reach 3 meters high. The park is home to herds of guanacos and wild donkeys, and sometimes solitary well-fed pumas can be spotted at night. The burros were abandoned by the Spanish conquistadores and the miners of colonial time.

                                    Los Cardones National Park

Cachi (alt. 2210m) is a charming colonial village nestled at the foothill of snow covered volcanoes, which play hide and seek during the rainy season. During the 15^th century, the locals who were subsistence farmers did not welcome the heavy handed administration of the Incas and fought successfully to keep their ways of life. The white-washed streets display many opulent adobe houses, remainders of its prosperous 18 and 19^th century when mining took place on both sides of the cordillera. Now, the village’s slumber is only broken by busloads of rowdy tourists, as tourism has become the main economy.

            

                                           Colonial church of Cachi

Andean Carnivals.

Andean populations take their carnival as seriously as the Brazilians even if their rituals are different. Carnival is a family affair, men and boys dress as diablitos, (little devils) and women wear very shiny and colorful raffled dresses, a tradition going back to the early Spanish colonization. The Humahuaca carnival is famous for its Indian, Criolla and Spanish cultural mix. The atmosphere was joyous but a bit wild with people throwing water balloons, tossing handfuls of talcum powder and flour and spraying white foam. Drunk youth stumbled on the spray cans which were littering the ground. I got sticky white foam on my hair (it looks like shaving foam). The dancing, marching and drinking were non-stop. Coincidentally, Salta carnival with its diablitos, water “bombas” (balloon) and foam sprays reminded me of the Indian carnivals of Peru, Bolivia and San Pedro de Atacama in Chile.

         

                                                   Diablitos de Humahuaca

They are all very similar, except for the music. In Humahuaca it was distinctly Criolla, not Indian. These similar carnival traditions perhaps result from population mixing. In the 15^th century, the Incas colonized the Salta region and as customary, forcibly resettled uncooperative population to replace it with a more dependable people. The result was a strained ethnic mix which greatly facilitated the Spanish conquest.

Argentina under new management.

Gone are the days when restaurants were competing among themselves not by the quality of their food but by the competitiveness of their peso/dollar exchange rate. Patrons were selecting eateries by their exchange rate rather than their food! Now, the restaurateurs are back in the kitchen! After years of Kirchnerism, named after the husband (the late Nestor Kirchner) and wife (Cristina) presidential team, the newly elected president Mauricio Macri is trying to make Argentina a “normal” country again. One of his first actions was to lift currency control and thus devalue the Argentine Peso by 30 percent to its more realistic black market value. Kirchnerism, a left-wing, authoritarian populist utopia destroyed Argentina’s economic dynamism. Even the marginal symbols of Kirchnerism are being removed. Notably the portrait of Evita Peron will disappear from the new 100 peso note, and the 200 pesos note will lose the picture of the Malvinas/Falkland islands. Both notes will display the less controversial pictures of Argentine iconic animals.

                       

                                              Soon a collector’s item

People met during this trip, like taxi drivers, guides and hoteliers did not miss Kirchnerism. They complained of its distorting and indiscriminate subsidies, red tape, lack of transparency and grand larceny by the political elite. These people are hopeful that life will improve and that the atmosphere will be less confrontational.

Carnival is like zica, hard to escape in Latin America. Visiting Salta again? Certainly, but in springtime with a friend and a car. I have to figure out where to escape the 2017 Carnival? Any suggestion?

Winterreise: From One Kingdom of Gloom to Another

This blogger lives in Brazil but traditionally spends Xmas and the New Year in France. Brazil, a country renowned for its cheerfulness and easy going atmosphere has fallen into a pit of gloom and doom. The country suffers from a toxic mix of economic recession, high inflation, political gridlock, choking corruption and the spread of the Zica virus. Because most of Brazil’s woes are self-inflicted, the people’s mood is down in the dumps, and the Xmas and New Year’s celebrations were unable to lift their spirits.
France, famously known for the malaise and miserabilism of its denizens, has barely survived 2015, its annus horribilis. Late December, mood and weather were unseasonal. The climate was warm and damp and the Gallic bleak chic had been supplanted by a combination of weariness, mistrust, anger and hopelessness. On November 13, Paris suffered its worse carnage since WWII. Subsequently, the country was thrust into the center of world news as the world stood in solidarity with aggrieved Parisians. The usually self-centered and self-absorbed French further recoiled onto themselves, oblivious of what was happening in the rest of the world[1]. Not even Father Xmas was able to shake out the shrouding gloom.

After November 13, everyday brought news of low intensity terror attempts by the so-called lone wolves, also called Marauding Terrorist Firearms Attacks (MTFA) and of jihadists’ arrests in scores of European countries, seemingly all linked to the November 13 attacks. Whatever the terminology, lone wolves or MTFA, the hapless French people felt that the state was unable to cope with extremist Islamic radicalization spreading out of control. Many blamed the Muslim community for its failure to reign in its youth. Although some of the terrorists had been petty criminals, many others had lived in decent families before quitting their job to move to Syria. Their radicalization was not the result of discrimination or socio/economic marginalization, contrary to the thinking of leftist politicians and journalists (known as bisnounours in French or Care Bears!). On this topic, French people resent being criticized for not making more social and cultural space for a community, whose religion is practiced in an increasingly intolerant way, a community intended to reverse liberal and secular gains.
The amusing footnote of these tragic events was the boost of François Hollande’s approval rating. The unpopular French president is used to poll swings, directly linked to terror levels. After each terror attack, he enjoys a poll boost, but soon after his popularity drops again, and is now on a downward curve.
The New Year’s Eve fireworks in Cologne, and on a lesser extent in other German cities shook the French out of their torpor, and unexpectedly an intense public debate across Europe ensued. There are no links between the events in Cologne and those in Paris except that in both instances the perpetrators reject Western values.
In Cologne, thousands of testosterone-charged migrant-cum-thugs, mostly from North Africa with a few from the Middle East, went on a rampage, sexually harassing, groping, and robbing women revelers. So far, more than 600 women have reported abuse to the police. At the outset, one must question the efficiency of the Cologne police who had originally reported a quiet New Year’s Eve, and  then later admitted having been overwhelmed by the concerted actions of the thugs. Conspiracy theories flourished: Had the police done nothing to embarrass Chancellor Angela Merkel for her pro-migrant policy? Or had the police hidden the extent of the rampage for the sake of political correctness?
The sexual attacks in Cologne were an eye opener. Very quickly, many editorialists recommended that political correctness be substituted by political realism aka an honesty culture[2]. To acknowledge that many would-be asylum seekers in Germany were in fact economic migrants who had become delinquents was a fact, not a racist comment. Liberal media outlets like the New York Times[3] and the Economist (January 16^_22,  2016) which had initially encouraged mass migration as an economic boon for aging European countries, became worried of the destabilizing effect of male-dominated, out-of-control migration. Migrant statistics were a concern, some 72 per cent of asylum seekers are young men. 

                 German Swimming Pool rules: Women are to respected no matter the size of the  swimsuit!

Western media pointed out the cultural gulf between Europe (i.e. its liberal and secular values and standard of living) and the migrants’ countries. With regard to the role of women in society, the gulf is actually an abyss. Many Arab countries treat their woman folk as second class citizens. On the other hand, European women cherish their freedom and do not want their human rights threatened as the female revelers in Cologne found out the hard way. It is reported that the prominent and controversial German feminist Alice Schwarzer said that “Germany is naively importing male violence, sexism and anti-Semitism”. On the contrary, a few women politicians from the socialist party (SPD) tried to minimize the problem by comparing the sexual assaults to those taking place during the Oktoberfest. The police strongly rebutted the comparison. Oddly, on the subject of migration, these women’s support for women’s rights takes a back seat to their politically correct rhetoric.
Cologne brought two issues to the fore: How to deport trouble-makers and how to assimilate asylum seekers when they settled.
To protect social peace, editorialist Ross Douthat recommends bringing brides and allowing family reunions. On the basis of the French and British examples and the San Bernardino case this blogger disagrees. Uneducated, unassertive and submissive Muslim women, by-products of a patriarchal culture, will not contribute to assimilation but will maintain the cultural rift responsible for the toxic multiculturalism. Coincidentally, on January 18, the British Prime Minister David Cameron indicated that Muslim migrant women should learn English “in the hope that they will turn into more powerful moderating forces” and prevent their sons and daughters from becoming jihadists. English will also help them to better integrate. If they fail to learn English Cameron warned that they may face deportation. Instead of bringing brides from home, and as permitted by the Koran, Muslim men should be encouraged to marry non-Muslim women in their adopted countries. By marrying local girls, they may integrate more easily and enjoyably.
Deportation is a politician’s pipe dream and a spurious promise to taxpayers. In its histrionic tabloid style, Express.co.uk of the United Kingdom (December 26, 2015) indicated that at the current 0.1 percent rate of deportation, it will take 143,000 years to repatriate the one million asylum seekers who have landed on Europe’s shores in 2015! Deportation is probably not a worry for the Cologne thugs; most of them have destroyed their passports anyway, and their home countries may be unwilling to extend the welcome mat. In addition, European countries cannot send back home people fleeing war zones or who may be killed.
Meanwhile in France, which is under a state of emergency, reality check is not on the agenda. The political class is spinning its wheels in a sterile debate on the government’s futile plan to strip dual citizens of their French nationality in terrorism cases. IS’ head hunters do not look at passports and would-be martyrs do not need them to claim their 72 virgins.
This blogger is back in Brazil where the mood is increasingly gloomy. This year’s Carnival will not offer the usual hedonistic escape from every day’s worries. Short of money, parties had to be scaled back; even the sale of Carnival masks is down, a blessing in disguise for despised politicians. Masks of heroes as well as villains are indiscriminately worn by revelers. This year, the most popular hero mask is that of the Japanese-Brazilian policeman who has participated in many arrests in operation Car Wash, Brazil’s biggest corruption scandal. In 2016, politicians are not making the cut, not even in the mask business.

                                                      The good guy is in the middle!  

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[1]Oddly, some of the blogger’s acquaintances were unaware of the San Bernardino (California) terror attack where an Islamic radical husband and wife team shot and killed 14 people a few days after the Paris carnage. [2] Jochen Bittner. http://mobile.nytimes.com/2016/01/16/opinion/can-germany-be-honest-about-its-refugee-problems.html?emc=edit_ee_20160116&nl=todaysheadlines-europe&nlid=34360468&referer=&_r=0 [3] Ross Douthat, January 9, 2016. http://www.nytimes.com/2016/01/10/opinion/sunday/germany-on-the-brink.html

Robin Hood is not Brazilian

 

Robin Hood is a folk hero who stole from the rich to give the poor. With the laudable goal of lessening inequality between their citizens, many Latin American populist governments have institutionalized Robin Hood’s deeds with uneven levels of success. Brazil for its part has taken the opposite tracks: it steals from the poor to give to the rich. Culturally speaking, Brazil is closer to Ali Baba and his 40 thieves than to Robin Hood and his Merry Men! However, many in Brazil wish that there were only 40 thieves!

The thieves are a diverse but incestuous lot: senior public servants, “new money” oligarch families, bankers and above all politicians from every hue. They spend an inordinate part of their time devising ways to milk the state and loot state-owned companies, setting in motion a plundering process which becomes an end in itself. The high jacking of state institutions by special interest groups deprives the state of its capacity to improve the quality of life of its citizens, particularly the most vulnerable of them. Colluding corporate and political corruption is squeezing the poor at both ends. Brazilian fat cats live off the poor.

During the last decade, Brazil has been touting that thanks to its welfare programs, it has pulled 20 million people out of poverty. This is true, but its pervasive looting culture prevented many more from being raised, and now with the Brazilian economy in the doldrums (self-inflicted), many people are falling back into poverty. Education, healthcare, housing and infrastructure are the four most critical sectors for poverty reduction but they are the most affected by looting. What is not stolen is wasted by mismanagement. Because corruption increases the cost of the government’s programs, quality falters and their numbers are consequently reduced.

Brazil’s education budget is a bottomless pit: the country spends about 23 percent of it tax income well above the developed countries’ average for very meager results. Most students attend classes part-time, results are abysmal, the drop-out rate remains vexingly high and poorly paid teachers are not very dedicated. Educational failure does not seem to be high among the country’s concerns. Not surprisingly Lula da Silva, the former president, proudly claimed that he never read a book in his life before becoming president!

The multi-layered public health sector is dysfunctional as well. It is the largest public system in the world. Last year, a survey[1] indicated that 93 percent of the respondents found this sector mediocre or bad. To compensate for the shortage of doctors, the state had to import thousands of Cuban doctors to care for the population in the far flung parts of the country. The health system repeatedly failed to contain mosquito-borne cyclical epidemics like dengue and more recently the Zica fever which are both transmitted by the Aedes eagypti mosquito. Zica is an African virus which causes birth defect in babies, principally micro-encephalitis. Many regions in the poor north-east of Brazil are in a state of emergency and the virus has now spread to 13 states. While the government is desperately trying to contain the disease, one health official advised women not to get pregnant!

Social and low income housing is in worse shape still. Even Dilma’s government (Dilma Rousseff, the current president) admits to gross mismanagement, an official understatement for corruption practices. Government watchdog institutions have disclosed that building costs are grossly inflated in order to provide political kickbacks to local politicians and public servants. As a result, the housing policy meets neither basic demand nor people expectation. Shoddy buildings collapse before completion, stay vacant or are used for unintended purposes.

                  

                       Social Housing, current Brazilian standards

Not only do the poor have to do with bad schools, mediocre healthcare and lousy housing, they see their jobs disappearing. Some 1.5 million jobs were lost in 13 months as a result of the political and economic crisis[2]. To top it all, the 10% annual inflation rate eats into their meagre income. The crisis has been exacerbated by Dilma’s macro-economic mismanagement to gain re-election in October 2014 and the meltdown of the state-controlled oil giant Petrobras triggered by the disclosure of a mega bribery scandal[3]!

The covert financing of the re-election campaigns of national and local political bosses (i.e. vote buying) is the main reason for diverting public funds. The second is for feather bedding and pocket lining at a family scale. Corrupt politicians and oligarchs are joined at the hip, the first follow the instruction of the second, all paid by tax payer money. In such a state of affairs, money and favors are the key political drivers, elections are meaningless, and people are frustrated and disenfranchised. This pernicious system has allowed the tycoons of large construction companies to make tons of money and set up illicit cartels to rig contracts. Not surprisingly, the productivity of many Brazilian companies remains poor even by Latin American standards!

                             

    Ex-president Lula (da Silva) as many Brazilians would like to see him.

The Petrobras bribery scandal and its upstream and downstream developments have become an entertaining political soap opera with dozens of industry big-wigs and politicians in jail or under investigation. To save their skin, many defendants, businessmen and Petrobras executives have signed plea bargains with prosecutors, and their singing has been cacophonic. One tune led to another and more people are getting booked by the police. Recently, irked by the arrogance of the political class, the Supreme Court got involved and ordered jail terms for a leading politician of Lula and Dilma’s Worker’s Party and his alleged partner in crime, a famous investment banker. And the show goes on.

Thirteen years ago, the Worker’s Party won the heart and mind of low-income people by trumpeting its Robin Hood mantra and promising more socio-economic equality and integrity. Robin Hood must be rolling over in his grave.

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[1] By the Federal Medical Council.

[2] November 2015 data.

[3] The management of Petrobras has put a price tag on this corruption, writing off US$ 2 billion. The total loss was estimated at US$ 7.2 billion in 2014.