But they did reflect broad opposition to the austerity measures in many areas. He had won imperialist favor by restructuring debt, dismissing 100,000 municipal workers and auctioning off state-owned businesses. But Itamar Franco, a bourgeois critic of Cardoso, won in Brazil s mining center of Minas Gerais. Center-left candidate Anthony Garotinho, who favors restricted cutbacks, was elected in Rio de Janeiro. And Olivio Dutra of the leftist Workers Party, which has opposed the IMF deal, won in Rio Grande do Sur, an important agricultural state.
Elections can t turn back the capitalist assault on the workers.
But they can be a barometer of the Brazilian masses consciousness and outlook. Observers reported turnout was low and voters seemed subdued. The government had to deploy troops in four northeastern provinces to force the elections forward at bayonet point. That is where the landless farmers movement led seizures of stores and food shipments after a recent drought. The real opposition to Brazil s austerity plan will come in the streets as clinics are closed, school funds are cut, unemployment rises, and the workers and poor fight back.