DEM VOLKE DIENEN

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Category: Lateinamerika

 

In recent days, numerous actions and protests have been held across Brazil against the government's announced cuts to the education budget. Already at the end of September, the government decided to cut the education budget by a total of 2.4 billion Brazilian Real. Even before the new budget cuts, the budget for education was far too low.

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Category: Lateinamerika

We are publishing an inofficial translation of an Article of the newspaper A NOVADEMOCRACIA, that has been set to us:

 

April 26 is a milestone in the history of the Brazilian people's struggle. In 1999, the battle for the Vila Bandeira Vermelha (Small Town Red Flag) took place in the urban area of Betim, Minas Gerais. In memory of the men and women who fought for housing there, we are republishing this article, originally published in AND (A Nova Democracia) Year I, No. 5, December 2002.

 

 

In these first two weeks of December, a municipal government in Minas Gerais is making a handover of 180 public houses to the same number of families - about a thousand people - that faced 600 police officers of the dreaded Minas Police on April 26, 1999, in an abandoned public lot in the Bandeirinhas neighborhood of Betim, in the metropolitan region of Belo Horizonte. The brick dwellings with bedroom, kitchen, bathroom and courtyard form a unit with basic infrastructure (water, electricity, telephone, asphalting of the main roads, school, and the prospect of a health station and recreational area), christened Vila Bandeira Vermelha by the residents.

 

The action of the City Hall of Betim - the eighth Brazilian municipality in tax collection and the second in the state - is the success of the organized people who planned, acted, resisted, fought and even responded with violence, at the moment when the residents considered retaliation just to ensure one of the basic conditions of life: housing.

 

There were deaths. Two young workers, Erionides Anastácio dos Santos and Elder Gonçalves de Souza, were shot and dozens were wounded, including women and children.

 

THE PEOPLE'S STRUGGLE, ONCE AGAIN A CASE FOR THE POLICE

 

The struggle of Bandeira Vermelha was in no way different from the repression of the people's struggle in all periods of the country's history. From the revolt against fiscal exploitation by the imperial crown, to the resistance of the enslaved workers, to the abuses from the old republic, etc., the history of Brazil is marked by countless movements like this one. All suffocated with violence and cruelty.

 

The police violence against the families of the small town received a response equally from the organized popular movements and from true democrats, a support that, together with the willingness of the population to resist, prevented an even greater folly. Despite the campaign of terror waged by the municipal administration and the parties of the "Popular Front" (PT [Party of Workers], PCdoB [Communist Party of Brazil, revisionists and opportunists not to confuse with the P.C.B.], PSB [Socialist Party of Brazil]) that administered the town in those months - a campaign that the media played up in daily headlines, calling the families "communist invaders" - the people remained in place and "asserted popular democracy against the farce of the petist [PT - translator's note] administration."

 

The reverberations of the confrontation between the residents of the camp and the 600 police officers of the shock squad of the military police in Bandeira Vermelha received international notoriety. Mayor Jésus Lima saw no other solution than to negotiate with the residents of the camp for the land taken over by the 200 families, as decided by the Popular Assembly established on March 15, 1999.

 

"The garbage of the participatory budget and the housing program of the Municipality of Betim, in which tens of thousands of people had been registered for years without results, was finally exposed by the people, who decided to shape their destiny with their own hands," summarize the coordinators of the movement.

 

CLASS CONSCIOUSNESS

 

 

Gonçalves was the watch commander

 

In Minas Gerais, two organizations - the LPM (Luta Popular pela Moradia - Popular Struggle for Housing) and the MCL (Movimento das Comissões de Luta - Movement of Struggle Committees) - organize the poor population to fight for their rights. However, the heroic events in Bandeira Vermelha are like many others that occur daily in the major urban centers in all regions of Brazil. Groups of 100, 200 or more families invade a property, usually public land, to secure housing. They are workers who cannot pay the rent and are evicted with their families to live under bridges and viaducts or on the street in tents.

 

Except that the small town offered a new situation: the class consciousness of its participants. A situation that led to organization, solidarity and action. The terror of the police could not stop the willingness of the people to achieve their goals. The decision to resist guaranteed a way out of the countless dramas that these families experienced during the days of greatest tension.

 

People were aware that it would be a difficult struggle, but above all they were "tired of waiting for promises and hoping for pittances, " says Estela Andréa, 24, a young black woman who joined the fight with love and blood. The bullet that almost severed her leg on the day of the confrontation with the police did not discourage her. She spent several days seriously injured in the hospital, as did other comrades who were also hit with rubber and lead bullets.

 

For the reactionary press, the faceless of Betim.

For the Popular Assembly, Vila Bandeira Vermelha.

 

On the first day of the camp, it was decided that everyone would wear a scarf to cover their face: "a security measure against being prosecuted by the police and the same municipality, something that would inevitably happen" - says Cicero da Silva, one of the coordinators of the LPM. "We also decided to communicate with the press only through written communications, a decision that was relaxed on the first day and served as a lesson to confirm that this press would not help us in any way. They produced police papers, wrote detailed reports about the conditions in the camp and descriptions of people's physical characteristics, and tried to identify the leaders. The first articles in the newspapers called us the Faceless of Betim. Although on the first day we issued a statement signed by both organizations - LPM and MCL - to the entire population, the mayor said he did not know us," Cícero continued.

 

According to the LPM coordinator, " our way of organizing disturbed the city government a lot. Everything was decided in the meeting. We agreed that only two representatives of the two organizations would appear in public and that the negotiations with City Hall would be conducted by them and the members of the Support Committee. This decision has prevented the opportunists of the Popular Front from negotiating separately with some families and continuing to threaten them in order to divide our movement." According to Cícero, the support committee was formed by more than 40 units of the class and several democratic and progressive individuals. Their task was to coordinate solidarity with the families in the camp and to spread the goals of the struggle.

 

Marcelo was one of those who were persecuted

 

Negotiations with the city hall did not happen, as the assembly also decided to negotiate only directly with the mayor. Within 40 days, more than 30 requests from the Support Committee were rejected at City Hall. While the press attacked the residents of the camp, claiming that "these people didn't need houses and the movement only wanted to destabilize the government," in reality the city government was preparing a major repressive attack to evict the families. The showdown with City Hall strengthened the camp every day, because "the more its representatives slandered the movement, the more support the camp received." During those 40 days, there was no shortage of food, medicine, clothing, and doctors.

 

The Support Committee disseminated to the population of Betim and the capital the declarations of Vila Bandeira Vermelha - the name given to the camp by the People's Assembly in the first days, "to crown the unity of the two flags of the movements, to pay homage to the neighborhood of Bandeirinhas and to venerate the struggle, to raise it as high as possible, because, the color red represents the blood of the fighters that has been shed and that cries out for justice throughout the world. Those who fight raise a red flag with pride and take on the task of enforcing the ideals of those who gave their lives in search of freedom," as stated in a document of the LPM.

 

ALL FOR ONE: THE CONFRONTATION WITH THE POLICE

 

In the society we live in, real solidarity between people or groups is rare. Even when it comes to families who have nothing in life except a lot of disappointments, not even a roof over their heads. But at Bandeira Vermelha it was different. Dona Maria das Graças, 47 years old and mother of five children, participated in the rotation of comrades in charge of the camp's kitchen. She took all the risks, she said, because she already knew that "the police would come." She had a big problem in her life, which was paying a rent of R$ 180.00. She relates that she had moments of indecision "in which I wanted to throw everything away.... but seeing hopeful children and women who believed in the future. so I said: I will not".

 

THE POLICE STRATEGY

 

LPM and MCL coordinators report on the April 26 battle. Cláudio Andrade of LPM reports, "The camp was under heavy tension at the beginning. A helicopter from Rede Globo flew over the area at 6:15 a.m. and carried out several maneuvers. The comrades guarding the entrance to the camp noticed, still in the distance, the movement of a large police squad with two tractors in front of it, which began to surround the camp. The whole maneuver was filmed by the comrades. An alarm call mobilized the group coordinators, who quickly summoned all the comrades to a meeting. The decision to resist was made with the loud chanting of our slogans: 'Not even if things get tough! This land is ours', 'We are already on this land and we will not leave it'. Our slogan is 'Occupy, resist and build!', 'Occupy, resist and build people power!'".

 

Cláudio describes the strategy of the police in the attack on the camp:

 

1. siege to isolate the site, as was done in 1996 with Vila Corumbiara - a plot of land in the industrial area of Belo Horizonte that was taken under the coordination of the LPM and the MCL;

 

2. pressure through provocation, through the action of the commandos besieging the camp;

 

3. use of tractors to tear down the fences and clear the way for the troops;

 

4. use of helicopters to drop bombs inside the camp to cause panic;

 

5. dispersing the masses and arresting the leaders.

 

THE DEFENSE

 

The police strategy failed. Cícero da Silva, another coordinator of the LPM, explains why: "The comrades of the camp were prepared for the possibility of a police attack. We were aware that our independence, our decision not to submit to the chaos of the so-called participatory budget and the queues of thousands of families waiting for the housing program of the municipality, was considered an unacceptable affront by the municipality. That is why we have already talked about how to act in this case during the meetings to organize the land seizure. First and foremost, all the participants agreed on the right to defend ourselves against police encroachment. Secondly, we discussed how to defend ourselves, and we organized for that. Upon arrival at the camp site, the first task was to build a fence, which was then reinforced by building another fence inside. We decided that everyone should cover their faces and use different names so as not to be recognized and followed. We formed a committee for guard and self-defense, which took turns for 24 hours at the fences and inside the camp."

 

"During the 41 days we lived there before the confrontation, we conducted self-defense training with all the residents of the camp." Cícero also says that visitors had to show identification at the main gate of the camp and were only allowed to enter when accompanied by people known to the support committee. This measure was taken to prevent infiltration by the police. Not allowing the press in also served this goal . "During the meeting," said Cláudio Andrade, "the position of all comrades was decided and the coordinators took their places with their respective groups to defend the camp. Everyone knew what they had to do: protect the entrance to prevent police intrusion; set up a guard at another likely point of attack; organize the people in resistance into small groups; protect the children."

 

The people knew this would be a hard battle,

but most of all, they were tired of waiting for promises

 

"The troops approach and without warning or trying to negotiate, the tractor starts to destroy the first fence and the policemen start shooting. Gas bombs were thrown into the camp from the helicopter. At that moment, Comrade Elder volunteers to take over the video camera and record the steps of the police. Erionides took over the group that was to stop the onslaught of the tractor and threw a Molotov cocktail at it. This fearless action by Comrade Erionides cost him his life. He died from a gunshot to the head. Another comrade who accompanied him in the operation was seriously wounded while trying to help him. Shortly thereafter, Comrade Elder was shot in the abdomen. Despite his wounding, he continued filming, as the scenes he recorded show, until he was shot again in the thigh. Only then did he stop filming, as he could no longer walk. The comrades tried to help him, but when they realized the severity of his injuries, they carried him out of the camp to get help from the comrades of the Support Committee, who were on the scene and prevented by the police from entering the camp. Elder was able to be evacuated but died in the hospital. The killing of comrades Erionides and Elder confirms that snipers targeted their victims, especially those they thought were in command."

 

"The camp was bustling with activity. Amidst shouts of children and others. Those in command to call comrades to their posts. Other comrades were shot. Paulinho was hit and lost an eye. Izaú was hit by a bullet in the back and another in the heel. The bullet is still in his shoulder. Several comrades were hit by rubber bullets and seriously injured. Many children were injured by bomb fragments, because the police did not spare ammunition and used large-caliber weapons such as shotguns, machine guns, rifles, as well as stun grenades and tear gas," Cláudio concluded.

 

According to the coordinators, the news of the death of the two comrades had exactly the opposite effect to the intention of the repression to cause panic and disorganize the defense: "People doubled their strength and determination to fight. No one left the camp. The helicopter, nicknamed 'Big Bird' by the residents, was prevented from continuing its mission by stones and steel balls thrown with slingshots by the comrades who remained organized and determined in the camp."

 

Cléber Costa de Farias, coordinator of the MCL, summarized the struggle this way, "The reason we resisted until the end is that all the comrades were very well prepared. We spent a long time showing in meetings and assemblies that this was our chance to get housing. It was two years of preparation. When the police arrived, everyone knew that if we lost this chance, it would be much more difficult to get another piece of land. And in the confrontation, when we saw that two comrades were cowardly murdered and others were seriously injured, it led to more resistance, more determination and more solidarity, so that the families were determined to defend everyone who was there. Our movement had a vanguard. There was coordination with the clear goal of conquering our right. And that's what I think. We have to change that in our country. We have to conquer a piece of land, but also change everything that is there. People have no health care, no school, no work, they are at the mercy of misery. All of this has driven people to have the courage to stand up to the police. Misery drives people to determination, and when they saw a way out to free themselves from the rent, they took it. The experience of Bandeira Vermelha has made people aware of who is who in our country and who really defends them."

 

FURTHER REPORTS OF THE CONFRONTATION

 

Marcelo Frutuoso Batista, 28 years old, joined the movement because he had to pay a rent of R$ 240.00. The money he earned was not enough for food. He worked on the assembly [literally translated "route" - note of the T.] (Between Sao Paulo, Belo Horizonte and Rio de Janeiro) and performed various services until he met the movement. He and his wife did not miss a single meeting. His commitment made him coordinator one of the groups. Marcelo is still emotional when he tells of the events. Especially with regard to the bravery of women, who for him were the main responsible for the maintenance of the moral of all and who stimulated the men with their courage to hold through. "There were women who were stronger than their husbands," he says. In some cases, the husband had already given up the fight, but the wives encouraged him to continue. "Women who lifted the wounded children from the ground, took them on their arms and went to the front to fight. A real struggle, no doubt." The couple Maria Ribeiro and José Gonçalves de Souza, together with several other comrades, ensured the security of the camp and warned of repression. "The despair gave me courage, I was afraid to live under the bridge," says Maria.

Estela Andréa had no place to stay and lived in a house in Belo Horizonte, in which ten people of a family lived. "I lived from alms," she said. She found out about the movement and did not miss the opportunity, she reveals. "When I arrived, I had a lot to do to clear the bushes and build the huts," she says. Estela was "brave" on the day of confrontation with the police, says one of the coordinators of the LPM. In addition to other attacks, she was shot in the leg and she had to stay in the hospital for several days. For them it was not an easy line -up of an empty property, "it was no shithouse" she explains and reveals that everyone knew that the police would come to evict the people away. "There were many rumors about the arrival of the repression, and that was frighting us," she continues. "We thought that they would no longer come and that everything would get solved through negotiations," says Estela. But public violence came without mercy. "The People only wanted what was right," she said in conclusion.

 

Dona Maria Das Graças says she was in the kitchen when she was alerted that the police had surrounded the camp. "The tractor was already tearing down the fence," she remembers. She says: "The children shouted and I left the kitchen towards the gate. Some time later I saw how a person was shot. It was Elder who arrived, being carried by comrades and asked me to keep his documents. An MP (military police officer ) shouted on me, that I should go away and leave the men. How could I go away and leave the men? We formed a block and went out to confront the soldiers and to prevent them from entering the camp, "she said.

 

The men and women of the Vila Bandeira Vermelha let their highest human values speak and defended the honor of the community with all strength. Sticks, stones and their own bodies were the trenches against revolvers, shotguns, rifles and machine guns. The blood flowed quickly, symbolized by the two fallen workers: Elder Gonçalves de Souza and Erionides Anastácio Dos Santos, which were included in the series of the heroes of the people.

 

We are already on this land and we will not leave it!

Our motto is: occupy, resist and build!

 

Maria das Graças, Estela, Cícero, Cléber, Marcelo, Maria Ribeiro and Gonçalves are examples of people who have had a great experience of struggle, who not only live in this community, but who are certainly spread throughout this vast Brazil of social strife in the daily lives of poor families. They often experience a fierce struggle to ensure their needs and basic human rights. It is a fierce struggle to conquer what is actually theirs and their right. It was this identification with class, with the real conditions of life, that gave birth to the movement and its capacity to organize, resist and conquer.

 

The strong resistance of the residents of the Vila Bandeira Vermelha camp, the solidarity of the residents of the neighboring Bandeirinhas neighborhood, and the immediate intervention of the Support Committee prevented a second police attack on April 26. The Jésus Lima government was defeated in this attempt and was forced to retreat. The people won the battle.

 

THE POSITION OF OPPORTUNISM

 

The coordinator of the LPM, Cícero da Silva, denounces "the opportunistic actions of the electoral parties PT (Party of Workers), PSB (Socialist Party of Brazil), PV (Green Party), PSN (Party of National Solidarity) and PCdoB (Communist Party of Brazil), which have behaved in a fascist and police-like manner throughout the struggle in Vila Bandeira Vermelha, attacking the organizations of the independent struggle of the people." The coordinator reads us a communication that was distributed by these parties in the region under the title "In defense of life! No to violence!" was distributed. In this note, the opportunists blamed in 10 points not the military police or the municipal government, but the families of the workers who had resisted and prevented the massacre of hundreds of comrades. Point 1 of the note says: "The parties of the Popular Front of Betim defend the struggle for a piece of land and a roof over their heads as a legitimate right of the people. They affirm as a universal right that every person has the right to a standard of living that enables him to provide for himself and his family, his health and well-being, his food, clothing, housing, work, employment and education."

 

"As good opportunists," said Cicero, "they continue, down to point 3 of their manifesto": 'The parties of the Popular Front of Betim strongly condemn the use of violence in social conflicts and regret the death of two homeless people and those injured in the confrontation,' and in point 5 'they condemn and reject the vandalism of the right-wing councilors and leaders of the movement who, taking advantage of the body and the pain of family members, vandalized the city hall building. A public good of the city...', further in point 6 they warn the city council that 'right-wing conservative sectors of the city and the state are organizing in such a way that ungovernability, chaos and terror can be installed in our municipality' and cynically demand, after the massive attack of the police on the residents of the camp, 'far-reaching negotiations directly with the people concerned and the representative bodies of the homeless movement. We do not allow the use of coercion and violence as a means of resolving social conflicts.'" Cícero continues indignantly, "These parties that at no time went to the camp, not even on the day of the murder of two workers (whom they call homeless), even denying the existence of 10. 000 families registered in the Betim housing project and denounced that a guerrilla training camp was established in our camp, accuse the leaders of being terrorists and cynically present themselves as interlocutors between the municipality and the residents of the camp in a highly legal institutional language, in point 10: 'Finally, the parties that sign this manifesto, which have a tradition of fighting for a just and equal society, make themselves available to the parties as interlocutors in the search for a way out of the conflict and reaffirm their commitment to fight tirelessly, together with other democratic and popular forces, for the continuation of a government that has saved the citizenry in Betim. '"

 

"The nerves of these people are immeasurable," says the LPM coordinator. "Electoralists, cheats and crooks, like Jésus himself, who became a politician, supported land occupation movements and was elected mayor by promising to give land to the people. Once they take state power, they reveal very clearly their opportunistic attitude and their disregard for the lives of the people. They do not hesitate to kill to prevent us from acting independently and asserting our rights. It is as someone said at the funeral of comrades killed in battle, "The only land they gave was seven palm trees for two fathers of families. And Cicero concludes, "In the municipal elections of 2000, the year after the confrontation, the PT lost in the race for mayor, as a result of this struggle that exposed its anti-people and fascist face. In this year's elections, the former mayor, who this time ran for state deputy, came in third, disproving the reactionary maxim that "people have short memories.

 

STREETS WITH NAMES OF THE HEROES OF THE VILA

 

 

Vila Bandeira Vermelha: 180 houses with basic infrastructure. It is the culmination of the struggle of the people of Betim for the right to housing.

 

The community of Vila Bandeira Vermelha is considered the "nucleus" of the popular struggle. For the families who resisted the actions of the military police almost three years ago, 180 houses are being built. Another 20 families who also participated in the movement will receive their houses in the Teresópolis neighborhood in the same municipality.

 

On November 28, a few days before the inauguration of the new houses, the residents of the Vila addressed the Betim City Council, demanding that the new neighborhood be called Vila Bandeira Vermelha and that the streets be named "26 de abril" (Confrontation Day), "Erionides Anastácio," "Elder Gonçalves" and "15 de Março" (Land Seizure Day). They also had to confront PT councilors who attacked the residents who spoke in plenary against the people's right to determine the name of the neighborhood and the streets. The men, women and children of the Vila showed once again that they are aware of their strength and ensured the victory of the vote. "It was a matter of honor to show the city councilors who we are. If they voted against it, we would make our mark. And as for the name of the neighborhood, we are sure that no one will erase the name of Vila Bandeira Vermelha from the history of our country or from the minds of opportunists," said one resident.

 

Today, on the eve of the realization of the families' biggest dream - a house of their own - people feel victorious and recognize the value of the organization. However, all agree that the community of Vila Bandeira Vermelha "will now get going." "It was worth the struggle. It is a new reality, but the struggle will continue," assures Maria das Graças. Continue with unity, solidarity, awareness. This is the opinion of Marcelo, one of the coordinators of the commissions.

 

All of them are aware that "without unity, people cannot achieve anything." That is why they want to continue fighting and spreading the struggle for Bandeira Vermelha, so that it can serve as a model for the development of other communities that are currently going through the same problems as they did three years ago.

Details

Category: Lateinamerika

We publish an inofficial translation of an article that has been published on the website of the Newspaper ANOVADEMOCRACIA, that has been set to us:

 

 

April 26 is a milestone in the history of the Brazilian people's struggle. In 1999, the battle for the Vila Bandeira Vermelha (Small Town Red Flag) took place in the urban area of Betim, Minas Gerais. In memory of the men and women who fought for housing there, we are republishing this article, originally published in AND (A Nova Democracia) Year I, No. 5, December 2002.

 

 

In these first two weeks of December, a municipal government in Minas Gerais is making a handover of 180 public houses to the same number of families - about a thousand people - that faced 600 police officers of the dreaded Minas Police on April 26, 1999, in an abandoned public lot in the Bandeirinhas neighborhood of Betim, in the metropolitan region of Belo Horizonte. The brick dwellings with bedroom, kitchen, bathroom and courtyard form a unit with basic infrastructure (water, electricity, telephone, asphalting of the main roads, school, and the prospect of a health station and recreational area), christened Vila Bandeira Vermelha by the residents.

 

The action of the City Hall of Betim - the eighth Brazilian municipality in tax collection and the second in the state - is the success of the organized people who planned, acted, resisted, fought and even responded with violence, at the moment when the residents considered retaliation just to ensure one of the basic conditions of life: housing.

 

There were deaths. Two young workers, Erionides Anastácio dos Santos and Elder Gonçalves de Souza, were shot and dozens were wounded, including women and children.

 

THE PEOPLE'S STRUGGLE, ONCE AGAIN A CASE FOR THE POLICE

 

The struggle of Bandeira Vermelha was in no way different from the repression of the people's struggle in all periods of the country's history. From the revolt against fiscal exploitation by the imperial crown, to the resistance of the enslaved workers, to the abuses from the old republic, etc., the history of Brazil is marked by countless movements like this one. All suffocated with violence and cruelty.

 

The police violence against the families of the small town received a response equally from the organized popular movements and from true democrats, a support that, together with the willingness of the population to resist, prevented an even greater folly. Despite the campaign of terror waged by the municipal administration and the parties of the "Popular Front" (PT [Party of Workers], PCdoB [Communist Party of Brazil, revisionists and opportunists not to confuse with the P.C.B.], PSB [Socialist Party of Brazil]) that administered the town in those months - a campaign that the media played up in daily headlines, calling the families "communist invaders" - the people remained in place and "asserted popular democracy against the farce of the petist [PT - translator's note] administration."

 

The reverberations of the confrontation between the residents of the camp and the 600 police officers of the shock squad of the military police in Bandeira Vermelha received international notoriety. Mayor Jésus Lima saw no other solution than to negotiate with the residents of the camp for the land taken over by the 200 families, as decided by the Popular Assembly established on March 15, 1999.

 

"The garbage of the participatory budget and the housing program of the Municipality of Betim, in which tens of thousands of people had been registered for years without results, was finally exposed by the people, who decided to shape their destiny with their own hands," summarize the coordinators of the movement.

 

CLASS CONSCIOUSNESS

 

Gonçalves was the watch commander

 

 

In Minas Gerais, two organizations - the LPM (Luta Popular pela Moradia - Popular Struggle for Housing) and the MCL (Movimento das Comissões de Luta - Movement of Struggle Committees) - organize the poor population to fight for their rights. However, the heroic events in Bandeira Vermelha are like many others that occur daily in the major urban centers in all regions of Brazil. Groups of 100, 200 or more families invade a property, usually public land, to secure housing. They are workers who cannot pay the rent and are evicted with their families to live under bridges and viaducts or on the street in tents.

 

Except that the small town offered a new situation: the class consciousness of its participants. A situation that led to organization, solidarity and action. The terror of the police could not stop the willingness of the people to achieve their goals. The decision to resist guaranteed a way out of the countless dramas that these families experienced during the days of greatest tension.

 

People were aware that it would be a difficult struggle, but above all they were "tired of waiting for promises and hoping for pittances, " says Estela Andréa, 24, a young black woman who joined the fight with love and blood. The bullet that almost severed her leg on the day of the confrontation with the police did not discourage her. She spent several days seriously injured in the hospital, as did other comrades who were also hit with rubber and lead bullets.

 

For the reactionary press, the faceless of Betim.

For the Popular Assembly, Vila Bandeira Vermelha.

 

On the first day of the camp, it was decided that everyone would wear a scarf to cover their face: "a security measure against being prosecuted by the police and the same municipality, something that would inevitably happen" - says Cicero da Silva, one of the coordinators of the LPM. "We also decided to communicate with the press only through written communications, a decision that was relaxed on the first day and served as a lesson to confirm that this press would not help us in any way. They produced police papers, wrote detailed reports about the conditions in the camp and descriptions of people's physical characteristics, and tried to identify the leaders. The first articles in the newspapers called us the Faceless of Betim. Although on the first day we issued a statement signed by both organizations - LPM and MCL - to the entire population, the mayor said he did not know us," Cícero continued.

 

According to the LPM coordinator, " our way of organizing disturbed the city government a lot. Everything was decided in the meeting. We agreed that only two representatives of the two organizations would appear in public and that the negotiations with City Hall would be conducted by them and the members of the Support Committee. This decision has prevented the opportunists of the Popular Front from negotiating separately with some families and continuing to threaten them in order to divide our movement." According to Cícero, the support committee was formed by more than 40 units of the class and several democratic and progressive individuals. Their task was to coordinate solidarity with the families in the camp and to spread the goals of the struggle.

Marcelo was one of those who were persecuted

 

Negotiations with the city hall did not happen, as the assembly also decided to negotiate only directly with the mayor. Within 40 days, more than 30 requests from the Support Committee were rejected at City Hall. While the press attacked the residents of the camp, claiming that "these people didn't need houses and the movement only wanted to destabilize the government," in reality the city government was preparing a major repressive attack to evict the families. The showdown with City Hall strengthened the camp every day, because "the more its representatives slandered the movement, the more support the camp received." During those 40 days, there was no shortage of food, medicine, clothing, and doctors.

 

The Support Committee disseminated to the population of Betim and the capital the declarations of Vila Bandeira Vermelha - the name given to the camp by the People's Assembly in the first days, "to crown the unity of the two flags of the movements, to pay homage to the neighborhood of Bandeirinhas and to venerate the struggle, to raise it as high as possible, because, the color red represents the blood of the fighters that has been shed and that cries out for justice throughout the world. Those who fight raise a red flag with pride and take on the task of enforcing the ideals of those who gave their lives in search of freedom," as stated in a document of the LPM.

 

ALL FOR ONE: THE CONFRONTATION WITH THE POLICE

 

In the society we live in, real solidarity between people or groups is rare. Even when it comes to families who have nothing in life except a lot of disappointments, not even a roof over their heads. But at Bandeira Vermelha it was different. Dona Maria das Graças, 47 years old and mother of five children, participated in the rotation of comrades in charge of the camp's kitchen. She took all the risks, she said, because she already knew that "the police would come." She had a big problem in her life, which was paying a rent of R$ 180.00. She relates that she had moments of indecision "in which I wanted to throw everything away.... but seeing hopeful children and women who believed in the future. so I said: I will not".

 

THE POLICE STRATEGY

 

LPM and MCL coordinators report on the April 26 battle. Cláudio Andrade of LPM reports, "The camp was under heavy tension at the beginning. A helicopter from Rede Globo flew over the area at 6:15 a.m. and carried out several maneuvers. The comrades guarding the entrance to the camp noticed, still in the distance, the movement of a large police squad with two tractors in front of it, which began to surround the camp. The whole maneuver was filmed by the comrades. An alarm call mobilized the group coordinators, who quickly summoned all the comrades to a meeting. The decision to resist was made with the loud chanting of our slogans: 'Not even if things get tough! This land is ours', 'We are already on this land and we will not leave it'. Our slogan is 'Occupy, resist and build!', 'Occupy, resist and build people power!'".

 

Cláudio describes the strategy of the police in the attack on the camp:

 

1. siege to isolate the site, as was done in 1996 with Vila Corumbiara - a plot of land in the industrial area of Belo Horizonte that was taken under the coordination of the LPM and the MCL;

 

2. pressure through provocation, through the action of the commandos besieging the camp;

 

3. use of tractors to tear down the fences and clear the way for the troops;

 

4. use of helicopters to drop bombs inside the camp to cause panic;

 

5. dispersing the masses and arresting the leaders.

 

THE DEFENSE

 

The police strategy failed. Cícero da Silva, another coordinator of the LPM, explains why: "The comrades of the camp were prepared for the possibility of a police attack. We were aware that our independence, our decision not to submit to the chaos of the so-called participatory budget and the queues of thousands of families waiting for the housing program of the municipality, was considered an unacceptable affront by the municipality. That is why we have already talked about how to act in this case during the meetings to organize the land seizure. First and foremost, all the participants agreed on the right to defend ourselves against police encroachment. Secondly, we discussed how to defend ourselves, and we organized for that. Upon arrival at the camp site, the first task was to build a fence, which was then reinforced by building another fence inside. We decided that everyone should cover their faces and use different names so as not to be recognized and followed. We formed a committee for guard and self-defense, which took turns for 24 hours at the fences and inside the camp."

 

"During the 41 days we lived there before the confrontation, we conducted self-defense training with all the residents of the camp." Cícero also says that visitors had to show identification at the main gate of the camp and were only allowed to enter when accompanied by people known to the support committee. This measure was taken to prevent infiltration by the police. Not allowing the press in also served this goal . "During the meeting," said Cláudio Andrade, "the position of all comrades was decided and the coordinators took their places with their respective groups to defend the camp. Everyone knew what they had to do: protect the entrance to prevent police intrusion; set up a guard at another likely point of attack; organize the people in resistance into small groups; protect the children."

 

The people knew this would be a hard battle,

but most of all, they were tired of waiting for promises

 

"The troops approach and without warning or trying to negotiate, the tractor starts to destroy the first fence and the policemen start shooting. Gas bombs were thrown into the camp from the helicopter. At that moment, Comrade Elder volunteers to take over the video camera and record the steps of the police. Erionides took over the group that was to stop the onslaught of the tractor and threw a Molotov cocktail at it. This fearless action by Comrade Erionides cost him his life. He died from a gunshot to the head. Another comrade who accompanied him in the operation was seriously wounded while trying to help him. Shortly thereafter, Comrade Elder was shot in the abdomen. Despite his wounding, he continued filming, as the scenes he recorded show, until he was shot again in the thigh. Only then did he stop filming, as he could no longer walk. The comrades tried to help him, but when they realized the severity of his injuries, they carried him out of the camp to get help from the comrades of the Support Committee, who were on the scene and prevented by the police from entering the camp. Elder was able to be evacuated but died in the hospital. The killing of comrades Erionides and Elder confirms that snipers targeted their victims, especially those they thought were in command."

 

"The camp was bustling with activity. Amidst shouts of children and others. Those in command to call comrades to their posts. Other comrades were shot. Paulinho was hit and lost an eye. Izaú was hit by a bullet in the back and another in the heel. The bullet is still in his shoulder. Several comrades were hit by rubber bullets and seriously injured. Many children were injured by bomb fragments, because the police did not spare ammunition and used large-caliber weapons such as shotguns, machine guns, rifles, as well as stun grenades and tear gas," Cláudio concluded.

 

According to the coordinators, the news of the death of the two comrades had exactly the opposite effect to the intention of the repression to cause panic and disorganize the defense: "People doubled their strength and determination to fight. No one left the camp. The helicopter, nicknamed 'Big Bird' by the residents, was prevented from continuing its mission by stones and steel balls thrown with slingshots by the comrades who remained organized and determined in the camp."

 

Cléber Costa de Farias, coordinator of the MCL, summarized the struggle this way, "The reason we resisted until the end is that all the comrades were very well prepared. We spent a long time showing in meetings and assemblies that this was our chance to get housing. It was two years of preparation. When the police arrived, everyone knew that if we lost this chance, it would be much more difficult to get another piece of land. And in the confrontation, when we saw that two comrades were cowardly murdered and others were seriously injured, it led to more resistance, more determination and more solidarity, so that the families were determined to defend everyone who was there. Our movement had a vanguard. There was coordination with the clear goal of conquering our right. And that's what I think. We have to change that in our country. We have to conquer a piece of land, but also change everything that is there. People have no health care, no school, no work, they are at the mercy of misery. All of this has driven people to have the courage to stand up to the police. Misery drives people to determination, and when they saw a way out to free themselves from the rent, they took it. The experience of Bandeira Vermelha has made people aware of who is who in our country and who really defends them."

 

FURTHER REPORTS OF THE CONFRONTATION

 

Marcelo Frutuoso Batista, 28 years old, joined the movement because he had to pay a rent of R$ 240.00. The money he earned was not enough for food. He worked on the assembly [literally translated "route" - note of the T.] (Between Sao Paulo, Belo Horizonte and Rio de Janeiro) and performed various services until he met the movement. He and his wife did not miss a single meeting. His commitment made him coordinator one of the groups. Marcelo is still emotional when he tells of the events. Especially with regard to the bravery of women, who for him were the main responsible for the maintenance of the moral of all and who stimulated the men with their courage to hold through. "There were women who were stronger than their husbands," he says. In some cases, the husband had already given up the fight, but the wives encouraged him to continue. "Women who lifted the wounded children from the ground, took them on their arms and went to the front to fight. A real struggle, no doubt." The couple Maria Ribeiro and José Gonçalves de Souza, together with several other comrades, ensured the security of the camp and warned of repression. "The despair gave me courage, I was afraid to live under the bridge," says Maria.

 

Estela Andréa had no place to stay and lived in a house in Belo Horizonte, in which ten people of a family lived. "I lived from alms," she said. She found out about the movement and did not miss the opportunity, she reveals. "When I arrived, I had a lot to do to clear the bushes and build the huts," she says. Estela was "brave" on the day of confrontation with the police, says one of the coordinators of the LPM. In addition to other attacks, she was shot in the leg and she had to stay in the hospital for several days. For them it was not an easy line -up of an empty property, "it was no shithouse" she explains and reveals that everyone knew that the police would come to evict the people away. "There were many rumors about the arrival of the repression, and that was frighting us," she continues. "We thought that they would no longer come and that everything would get solved through negotiations," says Estela. But public violence came without mercy. "The People only wanted what was right," she said in conclusion.

 

Dona Maria Das Graças says she was in the kitchen when she was alerted that the police had surrounded the camp. "The tractor was already tearing down the fence," she remembers. She says: "The children shouted and I left the kitchen towards the gate. Some time later I saw how a person was shot. It was Elder who arrived, being carried by comrades and asked me to keep his documents. An MP (military police officer ) shouted on me, that I should go away and leave the men. How could I go away and leave the men? We formed a block and went out to confront the soldiers and to prevent them from entering the camp, "she said.

 

The men and women of the Vila Bandeira Vermelha let their highest human values speak and defended the honor of the community with all strength. Sticks, stones and their own bodies were the trenches against revolvers, shotguns, rifles and machine guns. The blood flowed quickly, symbolized by the two fallen workers: Elder Gonçalves de Souza and Erionides Anastácio Dos Santos, which were included in the series of the heroes of the people.

 

We are already on this land and we will not leave it!

Our motto is: occupy, resist and build!

 

Maria das Graças, Estela, Cícero, Cléber, Marcelo, Maria Ribeiro and Gonçalves are examples of people who have had a great experience of struggle, who not only live in this community, but who are certainly spread throughout this vast Brazil of social strife in the daily lives of poor families. They often experience a fierce struggle to ensure their needs and basic human rights. It is a fierce struggle to conquer what is actually theirs and their right. It was this identification with class, with the real conditions of life, that gave birth to the movement and its capacity to organize, resist and conquer.

 

The strong resistance of the residents of the Vila Bandeira Vermelha camp, the solidarity of the residents of the neighboring Bandeirinhas neighborhood, and the immediate intervention of the Support Committee prevented a second police attack on April 26. The Jésus Lima government was defeated in this attempt and was forced to retreat. The people won the battle.

 

THE POSITION OF OPPORTUNISM

 

The coordinator of the LPM, Cícero da Silva, denounces "the opportunistic actions of the electoral parties PT (Party of Workers), PSB (Socialist Party of Brazil), PV (Green Party), PSN (Party of National Solidarity) and PCdoB (Communist Party of Brazil), which have behaved in a fascist and police-like manner throughout the struggle in Vila Bandeira Vermelha, attacking the organizations of the independent struggle of the people." The coordinator reads us a communication that was distributed by these parties in the region under the title "In defense of life! No to violence!" was distributed. In this note, the opportunists blamed in 10 points not the military police or the municipal government, but the families of the workers who had resisted and prevented the massacre of hundreds of comrades. Point 1 of the note says: "The parties of the Popular Front of Betim defend the struggle for a piece of land and a roof over their heads as a legitimate right of the people. They affirm as a universal right that every person has the right to a standard of living that enables him to provide for himself and his family, his health and well-being, his food, clothing, housing, work, employment and education."

 

"As good opportunists," said Cicero, "they continue, down to point 3 of their manifesto": 'The parties of the Popular Front of Betim strongly condemn the use of violence in social conflicts and regret the death of two homeless people and those injured in the confrontation,' and in point 5 'they condemn and reject the vandalism of the right-wing councilors and leaders of the movement who, taking advantage of the body and the pain of family members, vandalized the city hall building. A public good of the city...', further in point 6 they warn the city council that 'right-wing conservative sectors of the city and the state are organizing in such a way that ungovernability, chaos and terror can be installed in our municipality' and cynically demand, after the massive attack of the police on the residents of the camp, 'far-reaching negotiations directly with the people concerned and the representative bodies of the homeless movement. We do not allow the use of coercion and violence as a means of resolving social conflicts.'" Cícero continues indignantly, "These parties that at no time went to the camp, not even on the day of the murder of two workers (whom they call homeless), even denying the existence of 10. 000 families registered in the Betim housing project and denounced that a guerrilla training camp was established in our camp, accuse the leaders of being terrorists and cynically present themselves as interlocutors between the municipality and the residents of the camp in a highly legal institutional language, in point 10: 'Finally, the parties that sign this manifesto, which have a tradition of fighting for a just and equal society, make themselves available to the parties as interlocutors in the search for a way out of the conflict and reaffirm their commitment to fight tirelessly, together with other democratic and popular forces, for the continuation of a government that has saved the citizenry in Betim. '"

 

"The nerves of these people are immeasurable," says the LPM coordinator. "Electoralists, cheats and crooks, like Jésus himself, who became a politician, supported land occupation movements and was elected mayor by promising to give land to the people. Once they take state power, they reveal very clearly their opportunistic attitude and their disregard for the lives of the people. They do not hesitate to kill to prevent us from acting independently and asserting our rights. It is as someone said at the funeral of comrades killed in battle, "The only land they gave was seven palm trees for two fathers of families. And Cicero concludes, "In the municipal elections of 2000, the year after the confrontation, the PT lost in the race for mayor, as a result of this struggle that exposed its anti-people and fascist face. In this year's elections, the former mayor, who this time ran for state deputy, came in third, disproving the reactionary maxim that "people have short memories.

 

 

STREETS WITH NAMES OF THE HEROES OF THE VILA

 

Vila Bandeira Vermelha: 180 houses with basic infrastructure. It is the culmination of the struggle of the people of Betim for the right to housing.

 

The community of Vila Bandeira Vermelha is considered the "nucleus" of the popular struggle. For the families who resisted the actions of the military police almost three years ago, 180 houses are being built. Another 20 families who also participated in the movement will receive their houses in the Teresópolis neighborhood in the same municipality.

 

On November 28, a few days before the inauguration of the new houses, the residents of the Vila addressed the Betim City Council, demanding that the new neighborhood be called Vila Bandeira Vermelha and that the streets be named "26 de abril" (Confrontation Day), "Erionides Anastácio," "Elder Gonçalves" and "15 de Março" (Land Seizure Day). They also had to confront PT councilors who attacked the residents who spoke in plenary against the people's right to determine the name of the neighborhood and the streets. The men, women and children of the Vila showed once again that they are aware of their strength and ensured the victory of the vote. "It was a matter of honor to show the city councilors who we are. If they voted against it, we would make our mark. And as for the name of the neighborhood, we are sure that no one will erase the name of Vila Bandeira Vermelha from the history of our country or from the minds of opportunists," said one resident.

 

Today, on the eve of the realization of the families' biggest dream - a house of their own - people feel victorious and recognize the value of the organization. However, all agree that the community of Vila Bandeira Vermelha "will now get going." "It was worth the struggle. It is a new reality, but the struggle will continue," assures Maria das Graças. Continue with unity, solidarity, awareness. This is the opinion of Marcelo, one of the coordinators of the commissions.

 

All of them are aware that "without unity, people cannot achieve anything." That is why they want to continue fighting and spreading the struggle for Bandeira Vermelha, so that it can serve as a model for the development of other communities that are currently going through the same problems as they did three years ago.

Details

Category: Lateinamerika

We are publishing an inofficial translation that has been sent to us, of a document of the NÚCLEO DE ESTUDOS DO MARXISMO-LENINISMO-MAOISMO that was published in the Newspaper ANOVADEMOCRACIA:

 

Portrait of the 1st Congress of the P.C.B., with its nine founders, representing 73 communist militants in Brazil

 

 

One hundred years ago, a delegation of nine communist militants (there were to be eleven, but two delegates did not make it to the meeting), representing 73 communist militants, who broke with anarcho-syndicalism, led a simple event, but one that would forever change the physiognomy of Brazil. In a modest house in Niterói, Rio de Janeiro, the Communist Party of Brazil - P.C.B. was founded, initially called Communist Party - Brazilian Section of the Communist International (PC-SBIC).

 

Armed with a high proletarian internationalist spirit, the delegates took upon themselves to read and approve, one by one, the 21 conditions for the admission of Communist Parties to join the Communist International - Comintern. At the end, the nine proletarian militants emotionally sang the verses of The International, the world anthem of the working class.

 

Throughout its 54 years - until it was liquidated by João Amazonas' gang - revisionist, petty-bourgeois and bourgeois positions prevailed in the leadership of the Party, but not without the struggle of the most selfless, outstanding and firm of its cadres. Among them, Pedro Pomar stands out - as the highest communist expression when defining himself as Marxist-Leninist, Mao Tse-tung Thought -, Maurício Grabois, Ângelo Arroyo, João Batista Drummond, Carlos Danielli, Calil Chadi, Lincoln Oest, José Duarte, Carlos Marighella, Elza Monnerat, Osvaldo Orlando da Costa ("Osvaldão"), Dinalva Oliveira Teixeira and all the fighters fallen in combat or under torture in the Araguaia Guerrilla, among so many heroes and heroines of the class. And it must be emphasized that Luiz Carlos Prestes, despite having led the rightist positions in the party for 43 years, as he himself recognizes, when he made a public self-criticism for this error at the end of his life, broke with revisionism and defended the proletarian revolution until his last days.

 

In spite of the heroism and abnegation of so many and so many mass activists, militants, cadres and communist leaders, the P.C.B. could not achieve the goal pursued by its pioneers: to conquer Power for the proletariat and the masses, establishing a people‘s democratic republic and making the socialist revolution, putting an end to the reign of wage slavery of the proletariat and the forced labor of the peasants for the owners of the latifundium, sweeping away the imperialist semi-colonial domination and ending the oppression of the Brazilian nation. This, because in its history, the Party's left never managed to definitively impose itself, and the opportunist directions and deviations of all kinds prevailed and distinctively marked its history.

 

Deviations and revisionist positions that were condensed in not using the mass line as a method to know objective reality, to discover its laws and act in accordance with them in order to transform reality itself, as well as not applying the method of the two-line struggle by not understanding that the Party is a contradiction, in which womb the contradictions of the class of the society become manifested, and with that to give in the proletarian line and defend it from the other bourgeois and petty-bourgeois lines that, from time to time, rise up within the womb of the party. The two-line struggle, that is, to deal with divergences by applying the dialectical method of unity-criticism-transformation, taking revisionism as the main danger, because it is the offensive of the bourgeoisie in the ranks of the proletariat.

 

In politics, such fundamental problems have manifested themselves throughout its history due to an incorrect class analysis of brazilian society, mainly in not understanding what the national bourgeoisie is - taking as such the local big bourgeoisie, mainly its bureaucratic fraction, the one more linked to the state monopoly capital - and submitting to its direction, instead of seeking to establish the worker-peasant alliance, built on the peasant struggle for land under proletarian leadership - guaranteed through the communist party - as the nucleus of the united front of revolutionary classes in which could participate, under certain conditions of growth of the Revolution and greater intervention by imperialism, the left wing of the genuine national bourgeoisie (or middle bourgeoisie). In the same way, and as a consequence of this, there is a lack of clarity on which path to take for the revolution in the country, how and what line to establish for the revolutionary armed struggle, which in the concrete case of the revolution in the country, could only be the peasant war for the conquest of the land, and as part of the bourgeois-democratic revolution of a new type -New Democracy- and in the form of a joint democratic dictatorship of the revolutionary classes. Therefore, dictatorship led by the revolutionary party of the proletariat, maintained by the People's Army and exercised by the united front of the revolutionary classes, leads - the revolution - to Socialism uninterruptedly.

There are a lot of revisionist groups that claim the date as their own, among which stands out the PCdoB, the finished work of Mr. João Amazonas, a seasoned revisionist and traitor to the cause of Communism, with its rotten auxiliary line for the reaction, shameless support for the latifundium and the big bourgeoisie; like the academic group that goes by the name PCBrasileiro and its Trotskyist "Marxist theory of dependency", of contempt for the peasantry as a justification to wallow in reformism, legalism and pacifism. Not to mention others, like PCR, PCML, etc., all the Trotskyist groups, like the PCO; in short, all the electoralists, anti-armed struggle groups that do not have any identity with the purpose of the pioneers of 1922, nor with the communist heroes and heroines of this centennial of bloody struggles for Socialism and Communism.

Thus, and in a brief synthesis, the history of the P.C.B. can be understood in Three Stages, the Third Stage being divided into Two Phases.

 

Foundation and Infancy

 

The First Stage, from its foundation in the First Congress (March 25, 1922) to the beginning of the 1930s, spans a period of 10 to 12 years, during which its first three congresses were held, branded by Childhood and Ignorance of the entity of cadres concerning the Marxism-Leninism, what lead to deviations of right and of “left”. The context of the deep crisis of the system of exploitation and oppression in the country, in which uprisings with democratic inspirations against the oligarchy of the latifundium were exploding daily, could not be correctly taken advantage of by the party.

 

During this period, in 1925, the P.C.B. held its 2nd Congress. The scarcity and low diffusion of Marxist-Leninist literature, in addition to the weight of the anarchist traditions typical of a newly emerging workers' movement in the country on the party and in particular on its militants, produced an enormous effect on the formulations, whose content is right-wing, expressed in the thesis "agrarianism versus industrialism". Such thesis - that a few years ago the PCdoB redeemed as an "original application of Marxism-Leninism to the Brazilian reality" - clung to the appearance of the phenomena, since it identified in the strengthening of the big industrialists (mainly the bureaucratic fraction of the local big bourgeoisie) the advance of the bourgeois revolution. According to such formulation, the growth of industry -including and mainly the monopolist industry- produced, by leaps and bounds leads to the transformation of the "agrarian state" into the "bourgeois state (conclusion of the national-democratic revolution)"; it arbitrarily opposed the interests of the big industrialists to the interests of the owners of the latifundium , as if they were antagonistic. It was up to the proletariat to stay on the sidelines of these events and prepare to unleash the proletarian revolution when the "agrarian state" was supplanted by "capitalist progress”.

 

The Cominter severely criticized this formulation, which in many respects identified with the formulations of the Russian economists. Jules Humbert Droz, who at the time headed the South American Bureau of Cominter, pointed out in 1928 that the "industrial bourgeoisie is but one of the multiple faces of the latifundium", that is, "the industrial bourgeoisie is not opposed to the landowners, but its interests are intertwined with their interests" and that the big bourgeoisie "is, from its origins, linked to imperialism and unable to develop a bourgeois anti-imperialist revolutionary project". This will later be irrefutably proven with the betrayal of Getúlio Vargas - political representative of this bureaucratic fraction of the big bourgeoisie - to the democratic aspirations of the tenentist movement, in 1930, that in his government displaces the landowners from the hegemony of the old state,he did this by striking blows at the weakest oligarchs while respecting the general interests of the Latifundium and then reuniting with them, even giving them key positions in their government and maintaining and deepening the imperialist penetration of the country.

 

The party will struggle to assimilate Cominter's criticisms and rectify its errors. Through a closer link with the International, the P.C.B. succeeds in taking on a greater physiognomy of a Communist Party, produces hundreds of cadres, and becomes seriously committed to working for the Revolution.

 

Maturity and Growth

 

This is the beginning of the Second Stage of its history, from 1930 to 1960, a period in which the Fourth and Fifth Congresses were held, when the P.C.B. decided to put the struggle for power into practice and its left confronted reformism and the parliamentary path (soon ideologically grounded by the 20. Congress of the Khrushchevist USSR), regaining greater awareness of revisionism and the need to fight it.

 

Within this Stage, the Party, still young, audaciously decides to assault the skies: the People‘s Armed Uprising of 1935, through the National Liberation Alliance, as a democratic anti-feudal, anti-fascist and anti-imperialist united front, under the guidance of the Cominter and guided by its grandiose 7. Congress. The P.C.B., thus, integrates the Anti-Fascist World United Front, directed by the great Stalin, in the context of the preparations of the whole international proletariat for the great patriotic war, to defend the Soviet Union of Lenin and Stalin and the dictatorship of the proletariat against the bestial aggression that the Nazi war machine was preparing.

 

Despite this extraordinary achievement, after conquering power in Rio Grande do Norte, the Uprising failed nationally, because, mainly, the party did not understand the role of the peasantry and did not move its cadres to unite with it in the struggle for land and, in it, build the revolutionary Army of workers and peasants that could firmly establish the Power of the united front, under the direction of the proletariat, as had been oriented by the Cominter.

 

In his report to the 7. Congress of the Cominter, the great Bulgarian Communist leader, Georgi Dimitrov, thus points out the development of the ANL before the insurrection: "In Brazil, the Communist Party, which has built a correct basis for the development of the anti-imperialist united front with the foundation of the National Liberation Alliance, must make every effort to extend this front still further and attract, first and foremost, the masses of millions of peasants for the purpose of guiding them in the formation of units of the revolutionary people's army devoted to the end to the establishment of the power of the National Liberation Alliance" (emphasis added). A lesson that the party did not assimilate, causing the defeat of the Uprising.

 

The P.C.B., then, was practically disorganized by the strong repression that was unleashed after the uprising, and soon deepened with the coup d'état of Getúlio Vargas in 1937, which created the New State (In the original”Estado Novo” - The Trasl.) of fascist type, aligning itself with Hitler's Germany and Mussolini's Italy.

 

The balance of the '35 Uprising, only carried out a decade later, in which the errors were taken as the main aspect, served to strengthen the right in the party, which was influenced by the contemporary revisionist theses of Earl Browder (secretary of the Communist Party of the USA). In the P.C.B., headed by Prestes and in the context of the end of the Estado Novo with the overthrow of Vargas by the Army High Command and the "return of democracy" to the country under the government of the Americanophile Gaspar Dutra, the prevailing theses are "national unity in war and peace" and that, with the legalization of the P.C.B. by the electoral court, "bourgeois democracy has turned to the left". Positions that, in truth, were preaching the electoral parliamentary path (participation in the Constituent Assembly), of constitutional illusions, and of the rejection of the armed struggle.

 

It did not take three years for Yankee imperialism, strengthened as the most powerful imperialist power and with worldwide reach after the war, to confront the growth of the socialist camp, to unleash in Brazil, through General Dutra, a new regime of anti-communist terror. The P.C.B. is severely hit at the end of the 1940s, demonstrating the falsity of Prestes' theses and of the right wing in the party, which forces the whole party to a self-criticism that lays more foundations for the revolutionary line, mainly with the Manifestos of January 1948 and August 1950.

 

With these Manifestos, the party reaffirms the need for armed struggle, for clandestine construction and rejects constitutional illusions, as well as rejects the alliance with the big bourgeoisie represented by Vargas, although rightist deviations prevail regarding the armed struggle (failure to understand the peasantry as the main force of the Brazilian revolution and the agrarian revolution as a way to build the conditions for the armed democratic revolution), and also "leftists", by not distinguishing the big bourgeoisie from the middle bourgeoisie.

The two line struggle, with the left becoming more conscious of the need to fight reformism, gains momentum. In this period there were important armed struggles of peasants for access to land, led by regional or local sections of the P.C.B., even during Vargas' second government (elected again in 1950, whose government was marked by nationalist measures of the bureaucratic fraction, that, although they did not break with imperialism, were part of the struggle of the fractions of the local big bourgeoisie, and therefore confused many popular sectors). Such peasant armed struggles were greatly underestimated by the entire central leadership of the party and in the end were all channeled once again toward electoral opportunism and the old reactionary state.

 

After Getúlio Vargas' suicide in 1954, as an act to create commotion in the face of the attempts by Yankee imperialism and the comprador faction of the big bourgeoisie to overthrow him, the party that in its IV Congress (1954-55) had maintained the swing to the left since the Manifestos of 1948 and 1950, takes a new turn to the right and to reformism, once again considering Vargas as the representative of the national bourgeoisie and supporting Juscelino Kubitschek as the representative of this bourgeoisie, even getting on his electoral campaign wagon.

 

All this rightist formulation gains international support and reinforcement during the following years, when the 20. (1956), 21. (1959) and 22. (1961) Congresses of the CPSU took place, congresses of betrayal of socialism, in which Kruschov launched the theses of modern revisionism, that were summarized by Chairman Mao Tsetung as the "Two Wholes and Three Peacefuls", respectively "All People's State and All People's Party" and "Peaceful Coexistence, Peaceful Emulation and Peaceful Transition". In short, achieving Socialism by the parliamentary and peaceful path. In Brazil, the right wing of the party headed by Prestes, in convergence with Kruschov, will make the most complete systematization of revisionism in the country, in the Declaration of March 1958.

 

In that Declaration, the revisionists of the party will defend that the "anti-imperialist and anti-feudal revolution" will come "through the gradual but incessant accumulation of deep and consequential reforms in the economic structure and in political institutions, arriving at the complete realization of radical transformations". They openly defend collaboration with the dominant classes: "In the present conditions of our country, capitalist development corresponds to the interests of the proletariat and of all the people", going so far as to state that it was necessary to constitute a united front "with sectors of owners of the latifundium that have contradictions with US imperialism", without mentioning anything concrete for the peasant struggle.

 

In this context, the 5. Congress takes place (1960), two years after the Declaration, where there are more confrontations between the right and the left in the leadership of the P.C.B., but where Prestes' revisionist line is fundamentally guaranteed. A year later (1961), the right-wing line deepens, changing the statutes and even the name of the PCB to Partido Comunista Brasileiro (Brazilian Communist Party), to guarantee its legalization by the Superior Electoral Court. This attitude awakens hundreds of cadres to the task of making a clear split between Marxist-Leninists and revisionists, beginning with the "Charter of the Hundred" the reconstruction of 1962, being soon influenced by the great international struggle against modern revisionism, publicly unleashed in 1963 with the publication of the famous "Chinese Charter", a struggle led, already by then, by Chairman Mao Tsetung.

 

Constitution of the Party as truly Marxist-Leninist

 

Thus opens the Third Stage, in which the struggle against revisionism is taken up. Led by important Marxist-Leninist cadres, such as Maurício Grabois, Pomar, Carlos Danielli, Lincoln Oest, Calil Chadi and others, the split will establish for the first time the party - now under the acronym PCdoB - as an authentic Marxist-Leninist party, in order to come closer to the Mao Tse-tung Thought. This stage will be subdivided into two distinct phases, the First one from the Reconstruction to the liquidation of the PCdoB as a Marxist-Leninist party in the way ofMao Tse-tung by the revisionist clique of Amazonas with the defeat of the Araguaia Guerrilla. A second phase is the struggle for the reconstitution of the P.C.B, which is still going on today.

 

In the PCdoB, in the first years after breaking with the revisionism of Prestes, due to problems in handling internal contradictions - due to the prevalence of the legacies of opportunism in its ranks - many groups of communists who defended leftist positions were isolated, punished, and expelled, while others split away due to the administrative method in handling contradictions. Through conforming factions inside and outside the PCdoB, the correct and necessary two-line struggle was blocked by the Central Committee, preventing the great advance that the left could have achieved at that moment, producing serious damage to the party and the Brazilian revolution.

 

Among the fractions, the PCR of Amaro Luiz de Carvalho, the Capivara and Manoel Lisboa, the PCdoB-Ala Vermelha etc. stand out. All these factions will seek in Mao Tse-tung Thought and in the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution the torch to illuminate the path of the Brazilian revolution and will advance in its assimilation, defending the path of the People‘s War.

 

At the same time, in the PCBrasileiro of Prestes, after the 1964 coup and its complete shutdown, new splits of revolutionary cadres emerged against the oportunist leadership, but the vast majority took the path of "Focism" and "Guevarism", in short, petty-bourgeois militarism, rejecting party building. This was the case of the PCBR, ALN, VPR, MR8, PRT, etc. Some of these processes of will later make self-criticism concerning the Fokist way and take efforts to reach the line of the brazilian revolution.

 

But in the period, the most important achievement in the resistance and combat against the fascist military regime, even with its problems of method of direction, is headed by the PCdoB. On April 12, 1972, alerted about subversive activities in the region of the lower Araguaia, the reactionary Army attacks the revolutionary detachments and the first guerrilla combats take place in the region known as Bico do Papagaio, a confluence of the borders of the states of Pará, Goiás (today Tocantins) and Maranhão, on the banks of the Araguaia. The Araguaia Guerrilla War had begun, a great event in the history of the people‘s resistance in our country, not only for the unforgettable heroism of its militants, but for having been the decision of the Party to open the path of the People‘s War in Brazil.

 

Although defeated, more than three years after its beginning and facing three great campaigns of siege and annihilation by the reactionary Armed Forces, the Araguaia Guerrilla deeply marked the peasant masses of the region. The cause of its defeat lies mainly in what comrade Pedro Pomar analyzed as a misconception of the theory of people‘s war and its derived consequences for the party - its militarization, as a necessity to lead it - and for the other instruments of the revolution. And beyond that, the underlying cause was the formalist adoption of Mao Tse-tung thought, due to the strong resistance from the right wing, which insisted on mixing and matching the strategy of the people's war with opportunist tactics. Finally, one of the consequences of the formalist adoption was the failure to understand the method of the two-line struggle, which prevented the Party leadership from further forging the assimilation of Mao Tse-tung Thought (as Maoism was understood at the time), because of the subjectivism of a dogmatic type within the leadership.

 

The left in the leadership of the PCdoB, which was already deeply weakened by the loss of Maurício Grabois and dozens of cadres in the Araguaia and in the cities, will receive a definitive blow with the fall of the Central Committee meeting in December 1976. The episode known as the Chacina da Lapa (Slaughter of the Lapa) - in fact an event resulting from the denunciation of high party leaders who opposed to the revolutionary line of the people's war - constituted an "Operation Capitulation". With the execution of the three remaining leftist cadres in the party leadership (Pedro Pomar, Ângelo Arroyo and João Baptista Drummond), the assessment of the Araguaia experience, which the Amazonian right wing feared would be carried to its conclusion, was interrupted.

 

Pedro Pomar and Ângelo Arroyo were shot right there, in the security house where the CC was meeting; the former was shot more than 70 times despite the fast that he was unarmed. João Baptista Drummond was killed during torture.

 

Later, the fight for a correct balance of the Araguaia experience was buried by a thousand opportunistic maneuvers by João Amazonas and his clique. The latter, manipulating the Party and scheming with some cadres to change their position, sank the organization into the "ostrich politics", hid behind the revisionist Enver Hodxa to attack Chairman Mao Tse-tung as a justification for abandoning the revolutionary line of the People's War and wallowing in the electoral path. Of all the revisionist factions and leaders, this Mr. João Amazonas, a minuscule figure only capable of provoking intrigues and machinations, incapable of any self-criticism, has disowned all those he had said he would follow; he bears the title of main traitor to the cause of the proletariat in the country, just like the new revisionist party he created under the continuity of the acronym PCdoB.

 

The struggle for the Reconstitution of the P.C.B.

 

Thus follows the history of the P.C.B. as the Second Phase of its Third Stage, which runs through the years 1980/1990, still in course, as a stage in which the Party, divided into many fractions and in the atmosphere of almost complete liquidation of the revolutionary movement, struggles to reconstitute itself as an authentic Communist Party of Brazil, Marxist-Leninist-Maoist, corresponding to the needs of the revolution at that time and in that country, to fight for the conquest of Power, inevitably, as a Prolonged People‘s War, for the proletariat and the people‘s masses, in the Revolution of New Democracy, uninterrupted to Socialism, as part and in the service of the World Proletarian Revolution, towards the luminous Communism.

 

A struggle that takes place in the context of a prolonged and complex period of counterrevolutionary offensive of a general character and made of desperate attacks against Marxism, against the Party, against revolutionary violence and the dictatorship of the proletariat; a period in which, in the world, there is the decay of Russian social-imperialism and the end of social-imperialist USSR, capitalist restoration in China, the rise of Yankee imperialism as the sole hegemonic superpower, the theories of the "end of history", "globalization", "new technologies as the engine of social transformations", post-modernism in its multiple forms, everything to embellish the unprecedented decomposition of imperialism.

 

In this context, as a bonfire of hope, the People's War was unleashed in Peru, led by the Communist Party of Peru under the leadership of President Gonzalo - who defined Maoism as a new, third and higher stage of development of the ideology of the international proletariat, initiating the general Marxist-Leninist-Maoist revolutionary counteroffensive, contributions of universal validity of President Gonzalo, raising high the banner of Maoism and the People's War. President Gonzalo and the People's War in Peru gave the communists of the world the task of raising Maoism as the sole command and guide of the World Proletarian Revolution, through constituting/reconstituting militarized communist parties to unleash people's wars in more and more countries, raising to new heights the New Great Wave of world revolution that has already begun.

 

In this Second Phase of the Third Stage of the history of the P.C.B., according to the publications of the Nucleus of Studies of Marxism-Leninism-Maoism that reach our editorial staff, the struggle for the reconstitution of the Communist Party of Brazil as an authentic Marxist-Leninist-Maoist party, mainly Maoist, has been set in motion, a militarized party, directed for 27 years by its Red Fraction, in the midst of clandestinity and building the three fundamental instruments of the Revolution concentrically and simultaneously, everything to culminate the Third Stage of the history of the P.C.B. and open the new and Fourth Stage, that of the prolonged people's war for carrying out the Revolution of New Democracy, uninterrupted to Socialism, as part and service of the World Proletarian Revolution as World People's War, and with successive proletarian Cultural Revolutions all the peoples of the world enter the luminous Communism.

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We are publishing an inofficial translation of the weekly editiorial of the Newspaper ANOVADEMOCRACIA that has been send to us:

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Category: Lateinamerika

We are publishing an inofficial translation of an article of ANOVADEMOCRACIA, that has been send to us:

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Category: Lateinamerika

The Inter-American Court of Human Rights (CDH) is an international court formed by the American Convention on Human Rights, ratified by members of the Organization of American States (OAS).

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