Antonio Navalón
At three different times and in three other places on the planet in the past week, they highlighted the meaning of this strange situation that demonstrated how worn out the fundamental democratic principles and the harassment many countries suffer in their consolidation as efficient democracies.
In Mexico, last April 23, President López Obrador fell ill. Seventy-two hours after he was sick, we only knew the information we could gather through Twitter or the little that Mrs. Beatriz Gutiérrez Müller and the Secretary of the Interior shared about the president’s health. During those hours, the only thing that was transmitted was, on the one hand, multiple theories and speculations about the seriousness of the President’s health and, on the other hand, the constant statements that it was only a third Covid-19 infection and that the President was in good health.
In this age of technology and smartphones, it is ridiculous to think that isolation also affects a photographer and his ability to capture moments. In the end, it was enough for someone to pass by where President López Obrador was to be able to take a photo that would attest to the actual state of the Mexican leader. Among the various speculations, the one with the most strength was that the President of Mexico had suffered a cardiovascular accident that had affected his physical and mental capacities necessary to exercise the country’s Presidency.
Indeed by the time this is published, the situation will have been clarified; however, this experience has taught us that never before has Mexico depended so much on the life of a single man. We are a one-man country; our present and immediate future – for better or worse – depends on that one man. More than thirty million voters gave a single man political power and the ability to alter the present and the future as never before in our nation’s history. And the figure and what Andrés Manuel López Obrador represents reminds me of the worst times of the most autocratic rulers of the 20th century.
On the other hand, and giving the benefit of the doubt, we must criticize the current administration on the handling of the crisis since, if it was only a Covid-19 contagion, it did not do what was necessary to nip in the bud the concerns and comments that – as we all knew – were going to occur in a case like this.
The second scenario occurred the morning of last April 25 when President Joe Biden decided to go on air through his social networks and – after reviewing the misfortunes he may have had and mentioning that his presidency has been a good one, that he had had to fix many things he found broken and that while he has not solved the very serious and vital crises surrounding him – he announced that he would seek re-election in 2024. That morning Biden, at the age of 80, not only wanted to make it clear that he would seek to resolve all the pending issues that plague his administration and the American people but that age is not an impediment to doing what one wants to do.
It has not been proven that the capacity of states, peoples, illusions, and even our most primal elements of survival are more vulnerable to destruction at the age of 30 than at the age of 80. But what is certain is that we come from a culture – that of leisure – and of which, I would like to recall, a term that has disappeared but that for a time was important, such as the “millennials” and the supremacy of the young over the old and the mentality that simply because you were young you had more opportunities than the generation to which I belong or the era of President Biden.
Donald Trump has said that Biden is too old and that his failures have left us at the foot of World War III. Trump is 76 years old, and if he were to become president again, he would be 78, although the only difference is that one would end – in case everything goes well – with 86 years and the other with 82, since the inauguration would be held on January 20, 2025. While a second can be the difference between life and death, years and belonging to a generation, in this case, does not make a difference.
The third scenario concerns Lula da Silva, the president of Brazil – who won power by a minimal difference of votes against Bolsonaro – and who embodied the triumph of the social democratic and civilized left in his country. After having lifted millions of Brazilians out of extreme poverty in his first term, he even had to suffer what his time in jail meant. But not only that, days after becoming president of his country, thousands of Bolsonaro supporters stormed the Congress, the Presidency, and the Supreme Court of Brazil. The assault on the Brazilian power dome was the sign of the clear division – almost in equal parts – that is lived in Brazil. Brazilians have a contained hatred, and even more, those who still believe and are supporters of the triumph of the extreme right that Bolsonaro incarnated in their country and that today is more valid than ever.
In view of the complicated domestic panorama and the situation of world equilibrium, Lula picked up his rifle and went to China with hundreds of businessmen. He did so not only to have his photo taken as he reviewed the Chinese state troops in Tiananmen Square but also to make it clear that, although the Brazilian subcontinent belongs to the Western orbit and is close to the United States, it is by no means separate from the significance of China’s role in the modern world.
Brazil’s president is also a man of considerable age, at 77, and hand in hand with his latest partner, he has decided that the end of his third term will be focused on bringing Brazil back into the land of opportunity while maintaining political balances. It should not be forgotten that when the Americans insisted on putting Brazilians – as well as the rest of the world – in a position of requiring a visa to enter their country, Lula responded by photographing every American arriving in Brazil and forcing them to have a visa. In other words, this man has a position of great dignity and a historical hangover for the years he lived in the face of American expansionism, as is the case, although to a lesser extent and less dialectically speaking, with the President of Mexico.
The world still does not know the costs and consequences of Chinese expansionism. What is certain is that today, if one wants to have one’s policy – regardless of where one lives – one has to be able to face reality. And reality tells us that the United States and China are currently the two axes of the same pole: that of economic power. And therefore, these are two countries that can alter the political structures of the planet.
López Obrador, Lula and Biden. One in his 70s, one close to his 80s, and the other in his mid-80s. Three men with an extensive and great tradition of political struggle and close to what seems to be – if biology is still valid – their last political acts are choosing and raising the issue of where best to defend ideas and the State. Three leaders call into question what is the stage and what is the most appropriate age to govern if, indeed, there is any suitable one to do so. Meanwhile, the peoples look on knowing that much of what happens to them depends not only on their efforts nor on the will of their rulers but on the accommodations and how this new puzzle that makes up the Asian-Western world will end up being formed.
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