Evangelical bench closes deal for new president after frustrated election – 02/08/2023 – Politics

The evangelical bench closed an agreement this Wednesday (8) to choose its new president. The definition was communicated during a service in the Chamber of Deputies after the parliamentary front carried out an election that ended up annulled for having more votes than signatures of gifts.

Under the agreement, deputies Eli Borges (PL-TO) and Silas Câmara (Republicanos-AM) will share the leadership of the bench for the next two years. Terms will alternate for six months, with power initially in the hands of the pastor from Tocantins.

The new leadership should be confirmed on the 15th, when a meeting of the Evangelical Parliamentary Front should take place to choose the new president.

“The most beautiful thing that happens here is when everyone gets together and comes to an agreement. We work more calmly. And I want to thank God for the lives of some brothers, who understood this moment that it was necessary to have peace in Israel”, said federal deputy Cezinha de Madureira (PSD-SP), who is from the same Assembly of God, as well as Eli Borges, but worked behind the scenes on behalf of Silas Câmara.

The agreement was sewn after two weeks of unsuccessful attempts. Silas and Eli even agreed with the alternation of the presidency, but both wanted to lead the bench in the first year of the legislature.

Behind the scenes, deputies on the bench say that the assessment is that the first year will be decisive for negotiating with the Lula government (PT) and curbing possible identity agendas that the left tries to pass in the first months of the new Congress.

The choice of the new leader should have taken place on February 2nd. For the first time, with no agreement yet closed, the evangelical bench would submit the names to a vote. Past elections had as a practice the acclamation of a president without the need for a vote. This has happened since the creation of the Evangelical Parliamentary Front in 2003.

Unaccustomed to holding elections, the bench suffered several technical problems with the voting process.

Parliamentarians who did not register on the list were able to vote — a maneuver that the internal regulations prohibit.

Deputy Sóstenes Cavalcante (PL-RJ), president of the block that will pass the baton, said that there was a divergence between the number of votes and the number of parliamentarians who signed the attendance list.

“Our system, due to internet problems, has several crashes, and that’s why we had problems on our list [de membros da bancada]. We had some who, because they thought the name was on the list, cast their votes. Because of this, my decision was to nullify the election at that time,” said Sóstenes after annulling the vote.

The annulment of the vote was only defined after more than four hours of discussion. In the meantime, Otoni stated that, if the claim was not annulled, he would go to court. “The election by the Silas Câmara group is being rigged […] Don’t people say that they are believers, the paddle of the world? Corrects gays, corrects everyone, and does this dirty thing in here?”

One of the oldest evangelicals in the House, with the first of seven terms starting in the 20th century, Silas Câmara comes from a strong family in the North Assembly of God. His brother Samuel Câmara leads the so-called Mother Church in Belém, the first Brazilian exponent of that denomination, founded in 1911. Jonatas Câmara, another brother, heads the Assembly of God in Amazonas.

Câmara himself, when he was elected for the first time, in 2019, saw the pacification around his name sealed on the same day. Five rivals abandoned the race in his favor, including Flordelis (then PSD-RJ). Three months later, her husband would be murdered, a crime for which she ended up convicted last year.

The evangelical bench has existed since the 1980s, but it was only made official in 2003, the same year that Lula arrived at the Planalto Palace after three failed presidential incursions. The Evangelical Parliamentary Front was born “destined to ensure the rights of the Christian people”, as stated in its statute.

This year, they are trying to consolidate their growth, with an effort for the bench to have a 30% participation in Congress — a percentage that, according to the expectations of leaders, should be the number of evangelicals in Brazil to be announced in the next Census.

The bloc even managed to expand its spaces of power in the Chamber with the election of more conservative benches and with the election of two leaders of the segment to key positions in the Board of Directors: 0 1⁰ vice-president (Marcos Pereira, from Republicanos-SP) and the 2nd vice-president (Sósthenes).