“It is barbaric for Brazil to lose the world’s leading role in the field of the green economy.” “The Petrópolis tragedy is directly linked to climatic events.” “It is inconceivable that Brazil is behind Chile and does not offer the best public education in Latin America.” “Our goal is strong education, strong industry, strong country.” “It’s absurd for people on the streets to live in the open, it’s not normal for a homeless city to be formed next to Trianon Park, in the richest city in the country.” “Brazil stopped thinking, daring, and became inhabited by mediocrity.”
The statements above do not belong to a politician in an election year, but to Josué Gomes, the new president of Fiesp (Federation of Industries of the State of São Paulo), which brings together 130 unions in the industrial sector, representing 30% of GDP (Internal Product Gross) national. He took over from Paulo Skaf, who remained in the position for 17 years.
Despite all the engaged speech, the son of former vice president José Alencar, who was at the side of former president Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva in his two terms (between 2003 and 2010), says he will not adopt any political direction at Fiesp, and that he was careful to leave his party, the PMDB, at the end of last year, before taking up his term, which ends in December 2025.
This Thursday (17), Josué, as he is known and prefers to be called, received journalists to expose for the first time the priorities of his mandate vis-à-vis the federation. Questioned by sheet if he has sympathy for Lula’s candidacy, the businessman, owner of the Coteminas textile industry, eluded the answer.
“I don’t contribute anything by giving my personal opinion on who I prefer [como candidato à Presidência da República]this has no impact on my condition as president of Fiesp”, says he, who has already been appointed backstage as Lula’s possible vice president or even as PT’s virtual minister of Economy.
“Some think that, having been a candidate for the Senate for Minas Gerais, [em 2014, quando perdeu a disputa para o ex-governador Antonio Anastasia, do PSDB], that I am a politician”, he said. “I had never joined any political party. when daddy passed away [em 2011], understood that I had received an inheritance from him and insisted that I join a political party. It was an impossible election, against Anastasia, a great senator, a great governor, and now a minister of the Federal Audit Court.
According to him, the votes he got – he came second in the dispute, with 40.2%, against 56.7% for Anastasia – were due to the strength of his father’s name, José Alencar. “They even say that my voice is similar”, he says, who considered the experience “wonderful”. “Dad used to say that the best thing about politics was the campaigns, the contact with the population is spectacular.”
“But I was careful to leave at the end of last year, so that there was no connotation that I was a candidate for something,” he said. “I am not a candidate for re-election at Fiesp, or for public office in the next four years,” said Josué, even defending a term of less than four years for the presidency of Fiesp.
Regarding economic instability in an election year, as businessmen openly talk about having “a Lula and a Bolsonaro plan” for 2023, depending on who wins the elections, Josué says that fears make no sense.
“Entrepreneurs do not have to be afraid of who will win the election. It is necessary to trust the Brazilian people’s ability to choose. The country will not end, it will continue”, he says. “Institutions in Brazil are strong, even if they are under attack.”
Josué Gomes also defended the tax reform and says he is already discussing the matter with the Minister of Economy, Paulo Guedes, but believes that the change will not come out in the coming months. He also defends the administrative reform that, according to him, has not come out so far because “the government doesn’t want to”.
Regarding the government of Jair Bolsonaro, he says that he will be remembered by the history books as a government that produced multiple attacks on institutions – on the polls, on the vaccine, on the press. “But if he eventually gets elected, I hope he does it differently.”
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