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| Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, President of Brazil |
Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva (Portuguese: [luˈiz iˈnasju ˈlulɐ dɐ ˈsiwvɐ] born 27 October 1945, known popularly as Lula,[2] is a Brazilian politician. He was a founding member of the Workers' Party (PT – Partido dos Trabalhadores) and ran for president three times unsuccessfully, first in the 1989 election, then again in 1994 and 1998. Lula achieved victory in the 2002 election, and was inaugurated as president on 1 January 2003. In the 2006 election he was elected for a second term as president, which ended on 1 January 2011.[3] He was succeeded by his former Chief of Staff, Dilma Rousseff.
He is often regarded as the most popular politician in the history of Brazil and, at the time of his mandate, one of the most popular in the world.[4][5][6] Social programs like Bolsa Família and Fome Zero are hallmarks of his time in office. Lula played a prominent role in recent international relations developments, including the Nuclear program of Iran and global warming, and was described as "a man with audacious ambitions to alter the balance of power among nations."[7] He was featured in Time's The 100 Most Influential People in the World for 2010,[8] and has been called "the most successful politician of his time."[9]
As of the 21st century, Lula is considered by most of the center, center-left and left-wing politicians and intellectuals from Brazil as one of the greatest Brazilian presidents.
In October 2011, Lula—who was a smoker for 40 years[10]—was diagnosed with throat cancer and quickly started chemotherapy treatment. Since the cancer was found he has successfully recovered and has since announced a return to politicsEarly life
Luiz Inácio da Silva was born on 27 October 1945 (but registered with a date of birth of 6 October 1945) in Caetés (then a district of Garanhuns), located 155 miles (250 km) from Recife, capital of Pernambuco, a Brazilian state in the Northeast of Brazil. He was the seventh of eight children of Aristides Inácio da Silva and Eurídice Ferreira de Melo. Two weeks after Lula's birth, his father moved to Santos with Valdomira Ferreira de Góis, a cousin of Eurídice.
In December 1952, when Lula was only 7 years old, his mother decided to move to São Paulo with her children to rejoin her husband. After a journey of thirteen days in a pau-de-arara (open truck bed), they arrived in Guarujá and discovered that Aristides had formed a second family with Valdomira. Aristides' two families lived in the same house for some time, but they didn't get along very well, and four years later, Eurídice moved with her children to a small room in the back area of a bar in the city of São Paulo. After that, Lula rarely saw his father, who became an alcoholic and died in 1978.
Lula was married twice. In 1969, he married Maria de Lourdes, who died of hepatitis in 1971, when she was pregnant with their first son, who also died.[12] Lula and Miriam Cordeiro had a daughter, Lurian, out of wedlock in 1974.[13] In 1974, Lula married Marisa, his current wife and at the time a widow, with whom he had three sons (he has also adopted Marisa's son from her first marriage).
Education and work
Lula had little formal education. He did not learn to read until he was ten years old,[14] and quit school after the second grade in order to work to help his family. His working life began at age 12 as a shoeshiner and street vendor.[15] By age 14 he got his first formal job in a copper processing factory as a lathe operator.
At age 19, he lost the little finger on his left hand in an accident while working as a press operator in an automobile parts factory.[14] After losing his finger he had to run to several hospitals before he received medical attention. This experience increased his interest in participating within the Workers' Union. Around that time, he became involved in union activities and held several important union posts.[15] Due to perceived incompatibility with the Brazilian military government and trade union activities, Lula's views moved further to the political left.
Union career
Inspired by his brother Frei Chico, Lula joined the labour movement when he worked at Indústrias Villares. He rose steadily in the ranks, and was elected in 1975, and reelected in 1978, president of the Steel Workers' Union of São Bernardo do Campo and Diadema. Both cities are located in the ABCD Region, home to most of Brazil's automobile manufacturing facilities (such as Ford, Volkswagen, Toyota, Mercedes-Benz and others) and are among the most industrialized in the country. In the late 1970s, when Brazil was under military rule, Lula helped organize union activities, including major strikes. Labour courts found the strikes to be illegal, and Lula was jailed for a month. Due to this, and like other people imprisoned for political activities under the military government, Lula was awarded a lifetime pension after the regime fellEconomy
"Under Lula, Brazil became the world's eighth-largest economy, more than 20 million people rose out of acute poverty and Rio de Janeiro was awarded the 2016 Summer Olympics, the first time the Games will be held in South America."— The Washington Post, October 2010[17]
As Lula gained strength in the run-up to the 2002 elections, the fear of drastic measures, and comparisons with Hugo Chávez of Venezuela, increased internal market speculation. This led to some market hysteria, contributing to a drop in the value of the real, and a downgrade of Brazil's credit rating.[23]
In the beginning of his first term, Lula's chosen Minister of Finance was Antonio Palocci, a physician and former Trotskyist activist who had recanted his far left views while serving as the mayor of the sugarcane processing industry center of Ribeirão Preto, in the state of São Paulo. Lula also chose Henrique Meirelles of the Brazilian Social Democracy Party, a prominent market-oriented economist, as head of the Brazilian Central Bank. As a former CEO of the BankBoston he was well-known to the market.[24] Meirelles was elected to the Chamber of Deputies in 2002 as a member of the opposing PSDB, but resigned as deputy to become Governor of the Central Bank.[24]
Silva and his cabinet followed in part the lead of the previous government,[25] by renewing all agreements with the International Monetary Fund, which were signed by the time Argentina defaulted on its own deals in 2001. His government achieved a satisfactory primary budget surplus in the first two years, as required by the IMF agreement, exceeding the target for the third year. In late 2005, the government paid off its debt to the IMF in full, two years ahead of schedule.[26] Three years after the election, Lula had slowly but firmly gained the market's confidence, and sovereign risk indexes fell to around 250 points. The government's choice of inflation targeting kept the economy stable, and was complimented during the 2005 World Economic Forum in Davos.
Economy
The Brazilian economy was generally not affected by the mensalão scandal.[27] In early 2006, however, Palocci had to resign as finance minister due to his involvement in an abuse of power scandal. Lula then appointed Guido Mantega, a member of the PT and an economist by profession, as finance minister. Mantega, a former Marxist who had written a PhD thesis (in Sociology) on the history of economic ideas in Brazil from a left-wing viewpoint, is presently known for his criticism of high interest rates, something he claims satisfy banking interests. So far, however, Brazil's interest rates remain among the highest in the world. Mantega has been supportive of a higher employment by the state.
Not long after the start of his second term, Lula, alongside his cabinet, announced the new Growth Acceleration Program (the Programa de Aceleração de Crescimento, or PAC, in Portuguese), an investment program to solve many of the problems that prevent the Brazilian economy from expanding more rapidly. The measures include investment in the creation and repair of roads and railways, simplification and reduction of taxation, and modernization on the country's energy production to avoid further shortages. The money promised to be spent in this Program is considered to be around R$ 500 billion (more than 250 billion dollars) over four years. Part of the measures still depend on approval by Congress. Prior to taking office, Lula had been a critic of privatization policies. In his government, however, his administration has created public-private partnership concessions for seven federal roadways.[28]
After decades as the largest foreign debtor among emerging economies, Brazil became a net creditor for the first time in January 2008.[29] By mid-2008, both Fitch ratings and S&P had elevated the classification of Brazilian debt from speculative to investment grade. Banks have had record profit in Lula's government.[30] The Lula Administration's economic policies also helped to significantly raise living standards, with the percentage of Brazilians belonging to the consumerist middle class rising from 37% to 50% of the population..
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