AFTER BECOMING the first woman elected president of Brazil on Sunday, Dilma Rousseff yesterday turned to shaping her new administration.
Her goal, she said in her victory speech, would be the elimination of extreme poverty in Latin America’s most populous country.
After coasting to victory in a second round of voting, taking 56 per cent of the poll compared with 44 per cent for her Social Democrat rival José Serra, the former Marxist guerrilla was due to take a week’s holiday after a bruising campaign that left her sounding exhausted as she thanked voters on Sunday night.
But yesterday morning the woman referred to simply as Dilma was already locked in meetings with advisers about the most important of the 21,000 official appointments she will make after becoming head of state on January 1st.
She is expected to continue the centrist policies of her political mentor, outgoing president Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva. He is reportedly advising her to keep his economic team in place, keeping on his finance minister and central bank chief.
“Dilma will govern in her own style but she will borrow heavily from the Lula era in terms of policy and personnel. After all, she played an important part in the successes of his government,” says David Fleischer, professor of politics at the University of Brasília.
The 62-year-old economist is little known by most Brazilians but was elected thanks to the strong backing of the charismatic President Lula, who during his eight years in power has overseen an economic boom and rising prosperity which has helped transform him into the most popular president in the country’s history.
Speaking to supporters on Sunday night Ms Rousseff promised that as president she would frequently be knocking on Lula’s door “and I am certain that I will always find it open”.
After casting his vote in the industrial city of São Bernardo dos Campos President Lula told reporters he would not be quitting public life, saying he still had “many things to do for Brazil”.
Such is the popularity of Lula, his future ambitions are likely to overshadow the start of Ms Rousseff’s presidency. Even on Sunday night as the Workers Party celebrated a third consecutive presidential victory José Eduardo Dutra, the party’s president, had to try and deflect reporters’ questions about an eventual return by Lula to the presidency in 2014. “I do not know if he wants to return. Even more so it is very early to be discussing this,” he said.
Despite not ruling out an eventual return to the presidency, President Lula has gone out of his way during the campaign to make clear that from January Ms Rousseff will be in command.
“The dynamics of Brazil’s presidency mean it is impossible for Lula be in control from offstage. Dilma will be in charge and for better or worse will be held accountable,” says Rafael Cortez, a political analyst in São Paulo. “Lula’s role will likely be that of fireman, ready to loan his huge popularity to help put out any fires in Dilma’s government. But he is already a ‘pre-candidate’ for the presidential election in 2014. If Dilma’s is not a successful presidency, Lula will return to try and guarantee a fourth term for the Workers Party.”
Brazil’s opposition now faces a period of reorganisation as it faces another four years out of office. The elderly leadership of the Social Democrats, based in São Paulo state, is likely to be challenged by rising star Aécio Neves, the scion of a political dynasty from Minas Gerais state who will attempt to use his new seat in the senate to take command of the opposition to president-elect Dilma.