The Press THURSDAY, DECEMBER 19, 1968. Another South American Dictatorship

Press, Volume CVIII, Issue 31866, 19 December 1968, Page 16

The Press THURSDAY, DECEMBER 19, 1968. Another South American Dictatorship

When a wave of violence and student unrest swept Brazil a few weeks ago, observers remarked that any changes in the form of government thus brought about were certain to be for the worse. Events appear to be confirming that forecast. The Congress has been suspended, and President Costa e Silva has taken powers which amount to government by decree. The flat rejection by the Chamber of Deputies of charges brought against an Opposition deputy, Mr Marcio Alves, of “ insulting the honour of the armed “ forces ” in a recent speech in the chamber, suggests that the Congress is in a mood to rebel against the authoritarianism of Marshal Costa e Silva’s Government. Mr Alves has been a persistent and courageous critic of the Government; and a federal tribunal has been examining a request by the Government to waive his parliamentary immunity and suspend his political rights. The Government apparently thought itself strong enough in Congress to take punitive action against Mr Alves, and must have been shocked when almost 100 Government members voted with the Opposition to refuse to allow Mr Alves to be “ disciplined.”

The Government's swift and ruthless, reaction is almost certain to increase the tensions noticeable throughout the country and to lead to further disorders. Marshal Costa e Silva’s pretext for declaring a state of emergency is that it is necessary to counter “ mounting subversion Among those arrested is one of the regime’s most outspoken critics, Mr Carlos Lacerda, a brilliant and ambitious former Right-wing Governor of Guanabara. Mr Lacerda and the former President Kubitschek (also now under arrest) had launched a non-party organisation called the Broad Front, which sought to have direct popular voting restored for the 1970 presidential election. As long ago as February the Government was showing anxiety about the movement, which it suspected of trying to undermine the Government’s authority. Marshal Costa e Silva, who is due to retire in 1971, bluntly announced that there would be no direct elections in 1970.

By depriving the Congress of its powers, the Government has shown that it intends to remain in office without consulting the people. Its action amounts, indeed, to an extension of the military coup which put Marshal Costa e Silva in office in March, 1967. Even at that time the armed forces were exercising dictatorial powers, which they had seized when President Goulart’s Left-wing Government collapsed in March, 1964. Dissatisfaction with the Costa e Silva regime has been most marked in education. A special writer in “The Times”, who found staffs, accommodation, and teaching equipment at the higher levels “ woefully inadequate ”, concluded that the students had plenty to protest about.

Events in Brazil underline a trend which in recent years has been consistently and depressingly observable in Latin America—the seizure of power by the military. Peru provided a recent example, when, in October, President Terry’s Government was thrown out of office and the President, who was well regarded as an administrator and had strong public backing, was sent into exile. Argentina. Brazil, Bolivia, Paraguay, and Panama are now all dominated by their armed forces. Democracy is fighting a losing battle in Latin America.