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 South American integration is "advancing fast and with our own resources," said Brazilian president Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva on Friday, July 18, during a regional summit in Amazônia with the presidents of Bolivia and Venezuela
Lula said the process has picked up speed following the creation of the Unasur (Union of South American Nations),which "enabled the reactivation of an ambitious infrastructure project" to which several countries of the region are committed.
"Less than two months ago in Brasília we signed the treaty creating Unasur, a treaty which has meant overcoming the inertia of resistances which for 200 years of independent life have impeded our unity," underlined the Brazilian president.
"The reactivation of this infrastructure project which links several countries is evidence that the integration process in South America is advancing fast and with our own resources", said Lula, who during the meeting signed an agreement awarding Bolivia a US$ 230 million credit for the construction of a highway linking the landlocked country with Brazil.
"With Unasur which is the political-institutional expression of this new regional concept, we can do far more," he added.
Lula said that the integration process not only means road links but also energy and financial integration, effective cooperation plus social and educational policies and the creation of integrated production chains through joint investments in strategic sectors.
But the Brazilian president also sent a political message saying that the integration commitment "should be characterized by frank and open dialogue and the permanent search for consensus, always respecting our diversity and the path, democratically chosen, by each of us."
Lula then added next to Bolivia's Evo Morales and Venezuela's Hugo Chavez whom face serious, sometimes violent, internal dissent that "the overwhelming majority of our peoples long for development, security, democracy and social justice", and "that is why our peoples have nothing to gain with confrontations and clashes, which are ultimately sterile."
Mercopress
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One would also have thought that the establishment of Unasur and the increased number of smaller regional gatherings would seriously represent a mature attempt to put differences aside in order to address some of the most important issues (which surely includes energy, fresh water, poverty, income disparity, and infra-structure). Yet, the more I look at these recent lofty goals, the more it becomes evident that either Brazil and Venezuela will be found running (or attempting to run) the show; each of them with a completely distinct political agenda, which is likely, in the long run to be deemed irreconcilable.
Venezuela, which recently managed to established a mini-alliance for itself, composed of a faithful list of smaller, poorer client states (Cuba, Bolivia, Ecuador, and Nicaragua), undoubtedly intends to assume the lead (if not control) of the region, by a more discrete version of the “good-old” revolutionary ideals, currently labeled as “Bolivarian”, whose ultimate goal is to spread its Rosy (but still radical) regime throughout the region, thus allowing Caracas in the end to be the New Latin Moscow of the Southwest… LOL
Brazil, on the other hand, always the “good boy”, while likely with the sincere intention to assist, ultimately intends to be perceived by the Western World as a grown up adolescent who just reached maturity and is therefore ready to assume its role at the “bottom of the top” with a permanent seat in the United Nations, and, possibly a permanent role within the G-8 group (perhaps a G-9?), where it would no longer be invited to their meetings just for “desert” (using Lula’s words).
As such, either spreading neo-Marxist ideas or promoting “economic integration”, Brazil and Venezuela go forth with common plans (without actual, realistic consensus), pursuing completely unrealistic lofty goals, simply to place them, in the end, in a position to achieve their hidden agendas. Worse yet, is their inability to foresee the inevitable source of significant conflict between them, in the long run… Hopefully, I’m being too pessimistic.