Why the MPs Crisis Paralyzes Congress – 4/7/2023 – Dora Kramer

Created in 1988 to replace decree-laws as instruments of rapid action by the Executive, provisional measures have since then proved to be problematic. They have already gone through several modifications of the rite —since they are an adaptation of parliamentarism— and continue to be sources of permanent friction to which Planalto and Congress seemed reasonably accommodating.

Never, however, had they been the reason for an open power dispute as now between the presidents of the Chamber and the Senate. There is rehearsal of agreement, but the tantrum continues. Deputy Arthur Lira (PP) does not want to lose control gained in the pandemic, when the joint committees were suspended and the MPs went straight to the plenary of the Chamber and, later, to the Senate examination.

Senator Rodrigo Pacheco (PDS) advocates the return of the commissions, arguing that the deputies held back the measures and left little time for the senators to debate. He’s right. That’s what the Constitution says and that’s what the Federal Supreme Court determined after the end of the pandemic.

So, why all this confusion that paralyzes the processing of the congressional agenda? Because the accumulation of friction resulting from the dispute for the presidency of the Chamber and the Senate left a trace of resentment between Lira and Pacheco.

The senator, instigated by colleague Renan Calheiros (MDB), Lira’s enemy in Alagoas, upset with what he saw as interference in favor of his opponent Rogério Marinho (PL) and supported by the law, does not give in.

The deputy, in his eagerness to maintain that provisional power, complains that the Chamber is under-represented in committees made up of 12 senators and 12 deputies. But that’s how it is in the Magna Carta. Therefore, points out a minister of the STF, the solution is for his excellencies to leave the nitpicking aside, abandon the tug of war that paralyzes Congress and try to comply with or change the Constitution.