National Executive Board Resolution: “With Lula and the people until victory in October!”

January 25, 2018

National Executive Board

WITH LULA AND THE PEOPLE UNTIL VICTORY IN OCTOBER!

A wave of indignation is washing Brazil at the country’s most difficult hour since we re-conquered democracy nearly 30 years ago.

Almost two years after the coup that has torn the Constitution, is tearing workers’ rights up, and is destroying national sovereignty, former President Lula is the target of judicial violence.

In defense of Lula and democracy, huge crowds gathered in rallies, schools, on the streets, on social media, in manifestoes and songs.

Slandered so often by the enemies of our people and our country, Lula resists with the strength of the people, who see in him their own image reflected, their dearest dreams, and their strongest hopes.

Lula has committed no crime. His accusers know that. His conviction is a judicial farce that embarrasses Brazil before the world.

Procedures in the Lula trial depart from the normality of the law, as stated by the greatest Brazilian and foreign lawyers.

In order to convict Lula, without any evidence and any crime, the 4th Federal Regional Court decreed that Car Wash judges and prosecutors did not have to comply with the rules set forth for “ordinary cases”. Once the state of exception was decreed, Lula’s and his family’s rights were violated throughout the entire process. Now, the indecent arrangement of votes by the three, 8th-panel, appellate court judges of the TRF-4 to plan their votes on the defense’s appeal exposed the trial’s political nature.

Lula was persecuted, accused, tried, and convicted in a process of exception that is the continuity of the 2016 impeachment coup against President Dilma Rousseff.

The strings that moved Operation Car Wash and the Porto Alegre appellate court in a biased process to convict Lula, without evidence and crime, are manipulated by the same sectors that have torn the Constitution up and the votes of 54 million voters in order to place a gang in the presidential Palácio do Planalto.

We have fought and will continue to fight to resume the social inclusion development process that has lifted more than 32 million people out of poverty, generated more than 20 million jobs, opened the doors of university to blacks, indigenous people, and the children of the workers, that eradicated hunger in this country.

We have fought and will continue to fight for the recovery of democracy, full democracy, which entails democratizing access to communication, breaking with the media monopoly and ensuring the right to correct information to all.
We fight to get over the coup, to call a sovereign Constituent Assembly that may adopt popular reforms and revoke the measures that have harmed the people and the country, as the so-called PEC da morte (‘death’ constitutional amendment), including through revoking plebiscites and referendums.

For all these reasons and on the eve of our 38th anniversary, at this decisive hour for the future of our country, the WORKERS’ PARTY National Executive Board, gathered in public assembly and attended by our governors, senators, lawmakers, and by national and state leaders, and representatives from the most important social movements, adopts the following Resolution:

1. Reaffirm the decision by the PT National Directorate that our brother Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva will run for the Presidency of the Republic in the October 2018 elections;

2. Denounce to the country and the world the judicial farce against Lula: the illegal actions of Car Wash police officers and prosecutors, the unfair and illegal sentence by Sérgio Moro, the indecent arrangement of the TRF-4 appellate judges and the connivance of [television network] Rede Globo with this farce;

3. Greet and thank the political parties, social movements, organizations, and personalities who, in Brazil and abroad, have condemned the persecution and proclaimed the democratic meaningfulness of Lula’s participation in the political and electoral process;

4. Deepen dialogue and uphold unity with political parties and social forces, seeking to establish a broad and solid alliance will all those who may agree on the government platform we are building and will submit to the country;

5. Establish increasingly more People’s Committees in Defense of Democracy and of Lula’s Right to be a Candidate, gathering brothers and sisters with diverse political visions to dialogue with the people about the persecution against Lula.

6. Orient the People’s Committees to be present with our message during Carnival celebrations; to participate in support of the strike led by the trade union national confederations against the pension reform on February 19; to actively take part in the activities of the International Women’s Day, on March 8, and to participate in the World Social Forum, in Salvador, on March12.

With Lula and the people until victory in October!

São Paulo, 25 January 2018.
National Executive Board of the Workers’ Party (PT)