Can anything be done about Brazil, India, and South Africa?
Brazil: Lula surely deserves a challenge from the Left, but Heloisa Helena doesn't cut it: "Mr. da Silva is so far ahead of his two main rivals -- the centrist former São Paulo Gov. Geraldo Alckmin and the leftist Sen. Heloisa Helena -- that the only mystery is whether Mr. da Silva will garner more than 50% of the votes he needs on Oct. 1 to score a knockout in the first round of voting or whether the mismatch will go to a runoff three weeks later" (Matt Moffett, "Lula Is Set for Costly Victory: Brazilian Leader's Election Strategy May Heighten Polarization," 23 September 2006: A4, <http://online.wsj.com/article/SB115896709022171847.html?mod=googlenews_wsj>). India: <blockquote>India, often touted as an emerging economic superpower and "the next China", seems bent on emulating some of the worst aspects of Chinese economic policy as practised before that country embarked on sustained industrialisation. One controversial policy allows the creation of special economic zones (SEZs), which are duty-free and tax-free enclaves. Lubricated by exceptionally lucrative incentives, these are meant to promote exports. India is planning to set up as many as 300 SEZs in its different states. Some of these will be dedicated to specific products or services, and some will be multi-product zones. Each of the larger zones will colonise up to 10,000 hectares (25,000 acres) of land. "This is liable to create one of the greatest land grabs in modern Indian history," says Sumit Sarkar, an eminent historian and writer, who recently retired from Delhi University. "India has never before witnessed the transfer of hundreds of thousands of hectares of agricultural land to private industry. Nor probably has any other developing country." To establish the SEZs, India's state governments are procuring farmland in coercive ways, at prices well below the prevailing market rates, and handing it over to promoters -- including big business groups such as the Ambani brothers, the South Korean steel giant POSCO, the Tatas, Mahindras, Unitech and Sahara. They stand to make huge super-profits. (Praful Bidwai, "Economic Zones, Path to Massive Land Grab," 15 September 2006, <http://www.ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=34732>)</blockquote> See, also, Analytical Monthly Review, "Land Grab and "Development" Fraud in India," <http://mrzine.monthlyreview.org/amr210906.html>, which says Left-ruled West Bengal is doing the same land grab protested by farmers and laborers. South Africa: "When the African National Congress assumed power in 1994, it pledged to right a historical wrong by redistributing 30 percent of white-owned land to black South Africans, whom apartheid had forced from their ancestral homelands, by 2014. To reassure white South Africans and prevent capital flight, the ANC promised that market prices would be paid and that redistribution would be gradual. But a dozen years into the 20-year plan, only 4 percent of the land has been sold." (Ian Bremmer, "Apartheid's Gone, But Poverty Remains," International Herald Tribune, 31 August 2006, <http://www.iht.com/bin/print_ipub.php?file=/articles/2006/08/31/opinion/edbremmer.php>). The SACP, many unions, etc. are said to be rooting for Jacob Zuma, but he doesn't seem all that promising. -- Yoshie <http://montages.blogspot.com/> <http://mrzine.org> <http://monthlyreview.org/>
