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Merkel in Brazil

German Chancellor Meets with 'Sheikh Lula'

By Jens Glüsing in Brasilia, Brazil

Angela Merkel is currently in Brazil on the first state visit by a German chancellor in over six years. But although Brazilian President Lula praised the German chancellor and Merkel returned the compliment, the outward display of affection failed to conceal differences of opinion between the two leaders.

The first thing Brazilian President Luis Ignacio Lula da Silva asked for was a copy of the current issue of SPIEGEL. He said he wanted to chat with German Chancellor Angela Merkel about the interview he gave the magazine during their meeting at the government palace Palacio do Planalto in the capital city Brasilia.

"In a few years' time, you will be able to call me Sheikh Lula," said the Brazilian president, who was clearly in high spirits during a press conference after a one-hour meeting with Merkel on Wednesday. In the interview, he announced that, following recent massive oil discoveries off the coast of Brazil, he wanted his country to become a member of OPEC.

Brazil's president is bursting with pride and self-confidence these days. The country's economy is humming, and on the international stage, Lila is a respected and sought-after man. The latest polls also show that five years after taking office he's extremely popular. Not even the resignation of his environment minister, Marina Silva, two days ago was enough to dampen his mood as he welcomed Merkel.

It was the first official state visit to Brazil by a German chancellor in over six years, a fact that Lula repeated a number of times and could also be read as criticism. Germany has neglected its relations with South America's economic giant in recent years, and the much-touted strategic partnership between the countries petered out into little more than routine diplomacy.

Even if they aren't showing it, the Brazilians are also disappointed that Merkel is spending less than 48 hours in their country, and that there is little more to her trip than the mandatory diplomatic program.

Lula also has a fondness for Germany. In private discussions, he likes to tell the story about how former Chancellor Helmut Schmidt was the first head of government in the world to receive Lula in the 1970s, when he was an important Brazilian union leader. It was a gesture that Lula, a sentimental man, would never forget.

Lula is also fond of recalling how the Friedrich Ebert Stiftung, a German think tank that is affiliated with the center-left Social Democratic Party, provided backing and support when he founded the left-wing Workers' Party (PT) in the 1980s. The former metalworker also likes to praise the important German metalworkers union IG Metall for providing him with international solidarity during strikes.

Lula values friendship and loyalty above everything else. The resignation of his longtime comrade Marina Silva earlier this week didn't surprise him -- the Brazilian press has been reporting for months about the deep frustration of the environmentalist icon who had become increasingly isolated within Lula's cabinet. But the fact that he first learned about the move on television clearly hurt his feelings. Marina Silva had become like a child who is growing up and whose parents can't tell whether they should let her go or hold on to her, said Lula, who loves to pepper his language with metaphors taken from family life or soccer.

A Businessman at Heart

He assured the chancellor that Brazilian environmental policy would not change, adding in a side-swipe that Marina Silva would continue to be his "former environment minister," and that the environment is "just as important to me as social policies."

His detractors are far from alone in doubting that. Lula's development plan for Brazil can be summed up in one term: economic growth. In Lula's eyes, Marina Silva and the environmentalists around her were getting in the way of the country's economic development. They opposed the construction of power plants, they hindered the booming agricultural industry and they delayed the paving of urgently needed roads.

On several occasions, Lula publicly distanced himself from his environment minister. When Marina Silva cited satellite images of the Amazon region to warn that deforestation had increased again last year, Lula questioned the accuracy of the numbers in a dressing-down for the minister. And on Wednesday, the president again claimed that, in reality, deforestation was down by about 60 percent.

Merkel lent a friendly ear to Lula's remarks. She praised Brazil's environmentally friendly ethanol-powered car engines and its production of fuel using sugar cane. But she also called for greater transparency in the country's environmental policies. The country's agricultural boom is directly linked to deforestation, which creates an image problem for Lula. To the outside world, Lula likes to present himself as being green, but in his heart, he's a businessman.

A Plan Reminiscent of the 1970s

Thanks to Marina Silva, Lula -- a canny political animal -- had managed to hide his duplicity on the environment issue. "But now the emperor has no clothes," says ecologist Roberto Smeraldi. The Germans will be the first to see which way the wind is blowing. Merkel and Lula have agreed to cooperate on the new plan for the sustainable development of the Amazon known as PAS, one of the Lula government's most important projects for the Amazon region.

PAS was drafted by Marina Silva, but Lula has handed the project over to Roberto Mangabeira Unger, his minister for strategic affairs. It was a slap in the face for Silva and prompted her resignation.

Mangabeira Unger, a Harvard professor who only came back from the US a few years ago and still speaks Portuguese with an American accent, is the most colorful figure in Lula's cabinet. He is pushing for the rapid settlement of the Amazon region, in order to protect it from an invasion from abroad. He recently boasted about the construction of a huge pipeline that he wants to use to bring water from the Amazon to the poor areas in the northeast of the country. He wants the billions earmarked for PAS to be used to build industry and infrastructure in the Amazon region.

In reality, behind the intellectual facade lurks a diehard nationalist, who sees the economic development of the Amazon region as the key to making Brazil an economic and political superpower. His rhetoric is reminiscent of the 1970s when the military regime used vague promises to attract hundreds of thousands of settlers to the Amazon region. The misery in the rainforest today is largely a result of this mistaken development policy.

Marina Silva's resignation has given Mangabeira Unger even more political weight. The professor does not mince his words -- Merkel will certainly not be able to complain about a lack of transparency during her next visit.

However, the ideology of this new Amazon strategist is sure to cause shivers to run down environmentalists' spines.