People's Democracy

Dilma Rousseff Wins Presidential Elections in Brazil

BRAZIL'S voters elected 62-year-old former Marxist guerilla Dilma Rousseff as the country's first woman president in a run-off election. She stood as the candidate of the ruling Workers' Party (PT) and was supported by the Communist Party of Brazil (PCdoB).

President-elect Dilma Rousseff pledged to eradicate poverty in her country on the back of an electoral triumph in which she secured 56 per cent of the vote. Delivering her victory speech before thousands of cheering supporters in the capital Brasilia, she said the eradictation of poverty remained her "fundamental" promise. "We must not rest while there are Brazilians going hungry," she declared. "I humbly ask for the support of all who can help the country bridge the gap dividing us and make us a developed nation," she told the crowd. She paid tribute to popular outgoing president Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva and said she knew "how to advance and consolidate his work." And Rousseff vowed "to honour" the women of Brazil, saying she hoped her win would allow "fathers and mothers to look their daughters in the eye and say, 'Yes, a woman can'."

As a 19-year-old economics student in 1967 Rousseff joined a militant left-wing group waging a guerilla campaign against the US-backed junta that overthrew the progressive administration of Joao Goulart. She was a key player in an armed militant group that resisted the dictatorship from the 1960s to the 1980s. After three years operating underground she was captured by Brazil's military police and was considered such a big enough catch that a military prosecutor labelled her the "Joan of Arc" of the guerilla movement. She was subsequently jailed and tortured for three years.  A cancer survivor, she was a minister of energy and chief of staff to Lula.

After her release, she moved to southern Brazil in 1973 where she was reunited with her now ex-husband Carlos Araujo, an imprisoned militant. As Brazil's dictatorship began to loosen its grip in the late 1970s Rousseff threw herself into the emerging political process. Following roles in city and state governments she served for two years as the country's energy minister after Lula took office in 2003. She became his chief of staff in 2005, a position she held until resigning earlier this year to campaign in the election.

Rousseff paid tribute to the outgoing president and assured Brazilians that while he would not have an official role in her government, he would always be close at hand. Rousseff pledged to continue Lula's popular social programmes which have pulled 20 million Brazilians out of poverty since he took office in 2003. "I want to unite Brazil around a project not just of material development, but also of values," she told supporters at the rally. "When we win an election, we must govern for all Brazilians without exception."

In an interview published in the newspaper Folha de Sao Paulo in 2005, Rousseff ruminated on her years as a militant. "We fought and participated in a dream to build a better Brazil," she said. "We learned a lot. We did a lot of nonsense, but that is not what characterises us. "What characterises us is to have dared to want a better country."

Jose Serra, her opponent in the run-off, was a former governor of Sao Paulo state who was roundly beaten by Lula in the 2002 presidential election. He could manage to secure 44 per cent of the votes, thanks to the ganging up of the entire right-wing opposition forces.