The Olympic Games opened last night at the famous Maracanã Stadium situated in the heart of Rio. Predictions that Brazil won’t deliver a successful world competition abound. There are widespread expectations that the country is “unfit” to host the Olympics as some of the expensive projects for the Games remained unfinished. Parts of Rio’s Guanabara Bay remains an open sewer for Olympic sailors according to most coverage.
But there are a couple of words of caution to share regarding the current news coverage on Brazil and the Olympics. In 2014 when the country hosted the World Cup, the view predominated that Brazil was not “ready” to host the competition. Many stadiums were still under construction mode until a month or weeks before the Cup. Meanwhile, millions of middle-class and upper class protesters then marched against President Dilma Rousseff’s government. There was widespread police strikes against low wages and crime ran rampant in the country’s largest cities most famously in Rio’s slums. But despite the odds, the World Cup was a resounding success. The stadiums did not come crumbling down and even when Brazil lost to Germany 7-1, Brazilians managed to cheer the Germans who won the Cup against Argentina. One can expect that Brazil will deliver a successful Olympic Games by the end of summer.
When Brazil won the competition to host the Games in 2009 the country rode a wave of economic success that led many to proclaim that it had arrived on the world stage. In 2009, the Economist published an article optimistically titled “Brazil takes off” and assessed the country’s economic growth as one of the strongest and most promising among the BRIC. Then President Luiz Inácio “Lula” da Silva seemed to epitomize all of Brazil’s achievements and the optimism about the country’s future economic growth and political stability. Lula was born in the northeastern state of Pernambuco which is known historically as the country’s most economically depressed region. Lula rose from shoeshine boy and street vendor to become an industrial worker at an automobile factory where he joined the local Worker’s Union. From there he became one of the founding members of the Worker’s Party (Partido dos Trabalhadores) in 1980. His rise to the presidency in 2003 was nothing short of meteoric. Lula’s presidency delivered on many of the promises of the Worker’s Party to Brazil’s working class bringing many to the middle. Lula hailed securing the bid to host the 2014 World Cup and the 2016 Olympic Games as confirming Brazil’s economic and political success and its need for “respect” in the world.
The optimistic news about Brazil’s economic standings in 2009 has now been replaced by negative pronunciations on the state of its economy. Overspending in public expenditure and in social welfare policies have dragged down Brazil’s economy into crippling stagnation and inflation. The Economist now announces “Brazil’s Fall”. It did not help that a widespread corruption scheme involving the Worker’s Party, former president Lula, and Petrobras, the national oil company, have led to the impeachment of President Dilma Rousseff in May 2016. Now more than economic woes, the very character of Brazilian democracy is threatened as Dilma Rousseff’s impeachment, in reality, looks more like a coup to her supporters and international observers. The Zika epidemic is another hurdle facing Brazil and threatening the Olympics. The Zika virus rightly raises fears in the heart of many young athletes and visitors because of its harmful effects on newborns.
We don’t know what lays ahead for Brazil’s economic and political future. If Dilma Rousseff is proven guilty of corruption, she stands the chance to permanently lose the presidency and the vote of a majority of Brazilians who elected her in 2014 will be dismissed. Brazil has more challenges during the Olympics than it did in 2014 when it hosted the World Cup. But, I don’t think that it has lost its capacity to host a successful game as proven by the opening ceremony last night. After all, Brazil regularly hosts the world’s largest party – carnival - every year at the famous Sambodromo which stands streets away from Maracanã Stadium. Despite the crime rate, the violence, and bureaucratic corruption, cordiality and improvisation are long known as defining facets of Brazil’s character and they will go a long way toward making the Olympic Games a success just like the 2014 World Cup.