TCE announces diligences in accounts of Doria and Rodrigo – 06/21/2023 – Politics

The TCE-SP (São Paulo State Court of Auditors) postponed the judgment of the 2022 accounts of the João Doria (without party) and Rodrigo Garcia (PSDB) management and decided to take steps to obtain data withheld by the government on the billionaire tax waiver of State.

The decision is unprecedented in the court and reflects the non-compliance with most of the dozens of recommendations made by the directors in recent years on this topic.

The State Attorney General ended up accepting to forward the data until Monday (26).

The reporting councilor for the accounts, Roque Citadini, criticized the government for the lack of transparency of tax breaks, estimated at R$ 53 billion for last year.

“Society has the right to know what benefit the billions left to receive from large or small employers return in quantity and jobs generated. The tax waiver must be an investment that the government makes, it cannot be simply an exemption from being simply a tax exemption that benefits one or more companies without any return to society”, stated Citadini, when reading the prepared report.

According to him, of the 8 recommendations made in the judgment of the 2021 accounts, only 1 was partially complied with.

The judgment was heading towards the approval of the accounts with reservations. However, counselor Renato Martins Costa proposed that the trial session be postponed and that the court take steps to obtain the data, which was accepted by the other members of the court.

The government has historically claimed tax secrecy in order not to disclose data.

“There is no state interest, no intention to deny me or prevent access to such information, there is only caution due to the constitutional right to secrecy”, justified attorney Jéssica Helena Rocha Vieira Couto, representing the state. At the end of the session, the prosecutor stated that the government could provide access to confidential data.

The secrecy argument was criticized during much of the session.

Councilor Edgard Camargo Rodrigues mentioned that since 2017 requests for data have been made and that the information has to be provided. “It is very strange that this is alleged in relation to the Court of Auditors. Because if the Treasury Department is able to maintain secrecy, wouldn’t the Court of Auditors have it?”, he questioned.

The rapporteur for the 2023 accounts, Robson Marinho, classified the data evasion calling it a “black box”. Dimas Ramalho, on the other hand, says that it makes no sense that the body that takes care of the accounts does not have access to the accounts.

At Alesp (São Paulo Legislative Assembly), the base of the past government boycotted a CPI (Parliamentary Commission of Inquiry) on the subject, which was chaired by deputy Paulo Fiorilo (PT).

Behind the scenes of the TCE, the critical tone and the outcome of the judgment of the account of the two governors already removed from power drew attention.

For the Public Ministry of Accounts, in addition to the issue of lack of transparency, the government committed a series of failures, such as irregular application of health resources, non-compliance with minimum spending on education, non-compliance with TCE recommendations and lack of transparency. Therefore, before the postponement, the body had given an unfavorable opinion on the accounts.

The State Attorney’s Office had already defended the assent, citing that technical bodies of the TCE had given an opinion in this regard.