Lula’s minister, Fufuca says that PP remains independent – 09/14/2023 – Power

New Minister of Sports, André Fufuca said that the PP, his party, will continue to maintain an independent stance towards President Lula (PT), and stated that he asked for priority to the demands of parliamentarians, including the release of amendments.

He took office this Wednesday (13), after Lula made changes at Esplanada – and fired former athlete Ana Moser from the Sports command – to make room for the centrão in the first tier of the government.

“The PP remains independent, especially because the PP has members who do not vote with the government, they are members of the opposition. But, on our part and the vast majority of the Federal Chamber, we will be helping the government in what is best for the country and we will continue helping, as we have already been doing”, said the new minister in an interview with Sheet.

Fufuca declared that the decision to keep the PP independent was made by the president of the party, Ciro Nogueira, who was minister of the Civil House of the Jair Bolsonaro (PL) government.

“The issue of the institutionality of the party’s position is not mine, it belongs to the party”, explained Fufuca.

Despite this, the majority of the PP bench, according to him, will vote in favor of projects of interest to Lula.

Fufuca took office in a ceremony at the Ministry of Sports this Wednesday in an event without the presence of Ana Moser. “She must have had some personal issue that made it impossible for her to come. But I still admire her.”

The former athlete became the target of the center when she left the parliamentary amendments blocked. The Ministry of Sports was left with more than R$200 million in resources inherited from the former rapporteur’s amendments — billions of reais that Bolsonaro left in the hands of Congress to expand his parliamentary base.

However, the Sports portfolio’s quota only began to be released when Fufuca was already on his way to taking command of the area. Maranhão, the state of the new minister, was the most benefited in the first batch of transfers for works and projects sponsored by deputies and senators.

From now on, Fufuca promised to speed up these appeals.

“Here today [quinta] We asked for full priority in parliamentary demands. Parliamentary amendments, demands from municipalities and states, this cannot simply be filed away in a drawer or waiting for the good will of anyone”, he stated.

According to him, there is around R$400 million to be prioritized, as this includes funds from amendments from previous years whose resources have not yet reached the municipalities.

At the beginning of the negotiations for the ministerial reform, members of the PP advocated that the party win the Ministry of Social Development, which takes care of Bolsa Família, and has a larger budget than that of Health and Education.

Fufuca minimized the delay in negotiations and the fact that he was left with the Sports portfolio.

He stated that the government called the PP to be part of the Esplanada. “And the space that was externalized to us was the Sports space”, he added.

An ally of the president of the Chamber, Arthur Lira (PP-AL), Fufuca was leader of the PP in the Chamber before becoming Lula’s minister. He denies that he negotiated the position without the support and approval of the PP representatives in the House. “In no way was it a personal decision, it was a collective decision.”

While negotiating ministries in the Lula government, the PP and Republican leaders seek to maintain bridges with Bolsonarism. The strategy is to leave doors open with both political camps waiting to see what the best course of action will be, keeping an eye on the elections and the correlation of forces in Congress.

PP and Republicans formally integrated the Bolsonaro government’s support base. Both acronyms, however, have wings that have aligned themselves with Lula since last year’s presidential campaign.

In public, Ciro Nogueira and deputy Marcos Pereira (SP), who presides over the Republicans, classify the parties as right-wing, reject participation in the government and affirm that the parties will remain independent.

Both, however, endorsed the making of agreements for Silvio Costa Filho (Ports and Airports) and André Fufuca to take over the portfolios.