It will elect it on July 6th. The dispute will influence the party’s relationship with the government and can generate cracks in the leading group whose long -term impact is difficult to predict.
The PT has had very fierce presidential disputes, especially in the 1990s, during the difficult party moderation process. The election shortly after the monthly crisis, which strongly shook the leading group, also had intense debates. But the departure of part of the petista left to form the PSOL, as well as the party’s pragmatic turn when it was government, made the PT presidency more predictable.
The most common is that, after more or less difficult negotiations, he wins the CNB candidate (“Building a New Brazil”), who, in its many previous incarnations, has directed the PT since the 1980s, almost uninterruptedly. We will return to this “almost”.
This year, former mayor of Araraquara (SP). Edinho is a pragmatic politician who has support from Haddad, Padilha, Dirceu, and even some members of other trends.
However, a dissident group of the CNB that includes Gleisi Hoffmann (PR), Jilmar Tatto (SP), José Guimarães (CE) and (RJ) is opposed to Edinho’s candidacy.
This dispute is not between moderate and radical, such as the great petist clashes of the 1990s. No one on the petista left would approach Quaquá, whose alliances with the right right led him to defend Domingos Brazil, accused of being the mastermind of Marielle Franco’s murder.
The fight is for positions in the next management. CNB dissidents want to keep their treasury under their control, even if Edinho is elected president. The treasury is responsible for distributing the money from the party fund.
As we saw in the last column, Gleisi Hoffmann’s appointment as minister was an attempt to cool this conflict, which comes at a difficult time: the government’s popularity is low, and the government wants to talk out, not inside.
Moreover, although the fundamental conflict is not ideological, the division of the leading group can have unpredictable consequences.
On the last 12th, Deputy Rui Falcão wrote a letter to the petista militancy about the internal dispute. After making an appeal by a left turn, he concluded: “Valor, generosity and integration of all militancy is essential, in this time of truth.”
“Time of Truth” is the name of the 1993 manifesto that baptized a crack of the original CNB incarnation, the articulation. The crack was led by Rui Falcão himself and allowed the petista left to win the PT direction for the first time that year. It didn’t work out. As the PT closed, the right approached the center by combining the PSDB, all as long as the real plan election approached.
In 2025, the left of the PT will not win the party presidency. But it can support one of the factions of the leading group in exchange for concessions that limit Edinho’s moderation.
It would be a pity. The election of the PT is a good opportunity for the party to resume its pragmatism, reconcile with the government and show that it is willing to talk to the rest of Brazilian society.
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