Congress under Lula complains about amendments, but pace is greater – 05/27/2023 – Politics

Deputies and senators point to the delay in releasing amendments as one of the reasons for the difficulties faced by the Lula government (PT) in its relationship with the National Congress.

Leaders of the centrão also demonstrate dissatisfaction with the lack of prospects for the Planalto Palace to unlock the funds it inherited following a decision by the STF (Federal Supreme Court) on the end of the rapporteur’s amendments – the main mechanism of political negotiation in the government of Jair Bolsonaro ( PL).

Despite complaints about the pace of amendments, data from the National Congress show that the execution of these resources has been slightly higher than the beginning of the Bolsonaro administration and the third year of the former president’s term.

In fact, Lula has given a smaller flow, until May, in relation to 2022 and 2020. As these are election years, there are restrictions on the release of amendments from July. Therefore, more speed is given at the beginning of the year.

In addition, the president’s interlocutors claim that it is natural that, in the first year of a new government, a period is necessary for the public machine to engage.

The Institutional Relations Secretariat, commanded by Minister Alexandre Padilha (PT), declared that “the pace of release of amendments follows the ordinary procedures for executing expenses, in accordance with the execution of projects within the sectoral policies of each ministry”.

So far, the government has authorized R$2.7 billion in individual amendments – those that every deputy or senator is entitled to and which are mandatory, that is, the Planalto must authorize it by the end of the year.

In Bolsonaro’s first year, less than R$200 million was released for these amendments. However, in 2022, an election year, more than R$ 8 billion were authorized from January to May.

In this first semester, Lula’s political articulation has adopted the strategy of prioritizing allies in individual amendments and transferring amendments that Bolsonaro has not yet paid off.

In recent years, Congress has pulverized billions of amendments with tractors, asphalt and transfers to health without observing technical criteria and regional priorities.

As amendments finance the works and projects of parliamentarians in the electoral bases, the complete execution of the action can take more than a year. This leaves invoice payment for later periods.

Members of the centrão say that the political effect of these old amendment payments is low. In addition, they challenge the bureaucracy of Lula government bodies, such as Caixa, for the approval of new amendment projects.

The new 2023 amendments released by Lula so far are concentrated in the Ministry of Health, whose process for dispatching them is simpler – transfers are made to municipalities.

Since March, members of the centrão have questioned how the distribution of the R$9.8 billion in resources that Lula received after the end of the rapporteur’s amendments will work and that planalto articulators promise to use as a bargaining chip with Congress.

The main ministries have drawn up rules to try to maintain control over part of that budget. But, according to Planalto assistants, there is still no forecast for the start of transfers of this amount, as the idea is to provide transparency of which parliamentarians and mayors have benefited.

This amount of R$ 9.8 billion is one of the most coveted slices by parliamentarians for not placing a ceiling on nominations per deputy or senator.

Despite the STF having decided that this amount should not become a bargaining chip in negotiations for support for the government, the PT administration has already promised to deliver part of the money inherited from the rapporteur’s amendments to expand its support base.

The Health portfolio has the largest share (R$ 3 billion) of the remaining resource of the declared unconstitutional budget. In an ordinance published on May 4, the ministry defined a series of priorities.

Health technicians claim that this ordinance was edited to try not to loosen control over the budget.

For the cost of primary care, for example, Health prioritizes the allocation of resources for the purchase of medical-assistance equipment, dental office equipment, renovation of basic units, among other actions.

Managers of states, municipalities and the Federal District must submit proposed amendments on a website set up by the federal government.

The Ministry of Sports also defined criteria for releasing the R$ 200 million reserved for the portfolio of funds inherited from the rapporteur’s amendments.

The value is small compared to what is available for Health, but it represents almost half of the discretionary amount (which is not used to pay salaries and other obligations) of the portfolio commanded by Minister Ana Moser.

During the Bolsonaro administration, negotiations between Congress and the federal government exploded the value of parliamentary amendments.

In 2018, there were around BRL 11 billion available for all types of nominations for deputies and senators, a value that rose to a level close to BRL 40 billion per year during Bolsonaro’s term – an amount that became even higher in the Lula government 3.

One of the reflections of this alteration is the accumulation of the so-called “remainders to be paid”, that is, funds pledged, but which were not paid during the year, and are left over for the following budget.

There are R$ 32.2 billion registered in these amendments leftovers. The STF’s decision on the rapporteur’s amendments also created insecurity about the remains to be paid from Bolsonaro’s extinct mechanism.

Codevasf (Development Company of the São Francisco and Parnaíba Valleys) paralyzed several works at the end of last year for not knowing how to use the resource that was classified as unconstitutional by the Supreme Court.

The state company began to unfreeze these works in recent days, after the Ministry of Integration and Regional Development published an ordinance laying down rules for resuming these actions.

According to the document, the continuity of the works depends on an analysis of the “conformity of the contracts”.

Bodies linked to the ministry, such as Codevasf, can only re-execute amendments that consider regional priorities and that have an impact on issues such as water security, civil defense and territorial development.

Among the contracts thawed by Codevasf are those for paving carried out by Construservice, a contractor suspected of corruption precisely with funds from the state-owned company.