The Brazilian people, this is no secret, are less and less interested in politics — and have received the words and deeds of those who hold public office with a distrust that seems to increase every day. Proof of this are the growing rates of abstentions in the most recent elections. Even in a country where voting is mandatory and non-attendance without justification can result in sanctions for those who are absent, the number of voters who do not bother to show up at the polls has increased from election to election.
In the 2006 election, just to remember, just over 16 out of every 100 voters registered with the TSE failed to go to the polls. In 2022, the number reached almost 21 for every 100 voters. If abstention continues to increase at the same pace, Brazil’s mandatory elections will soon register a number of absences similar to what is seen in countries where voting is optional.
Data like these awaken the almost inevitable temptation to blame the voter and his growing indifference to the choice of who will govern or represent him in Parliament for all the bad that exists in the Brazilian political system. It is as if the omission of the citizen at the time of voting was the main responsible for the poor quality of politicians who, in the exercise of their mandates, act as if they did not need to follow the laws that they themselves make.
Or by the acts of politicians who, once in possession of the power to make decisions that affect everyone’s lives, start to act as if they were there to be served and behave as if the only utility of the state apparatus was to serve their interests. Or by the actions of politicians who do not show the slightest shame when it comes to drafting laws that shamelessly benefit them — without giving the slightest importance to the judgment that society will make of their attitudes. In view of this, it is a case of asking: who is to blame? Of the voter who increasingly distances himself from the political process or of the politicians who do not take actions capable of attracting the confidence and respect of the voter?
An eloquent example of the lack of appreciation of politicians for compliance with the laws that they themselves approved and the ease with which they legislate for their own benefit was given by the Chamber of Deputies on Thursday of last week. At the drop of a hat, the House approved the Proposed Constitutional Amendment 9/2023 — taken to the plenary by decision of President Arthur Lira (PP/AL) without even having been considered by the committee that should analyze it.
The idea of the project is to amnesty political parties for non-compliance with the rule that establishes quotas by gender and race in the definition of the slates registered to run in the elections. It was the congressmen themselves who approved the creation of these quotas, back in the 1990s. As of 2018, decisions by the Superior Electoral Court and the Federal Supreme Court understood that the electoral campaigns of women and black people would be entitled to 30% of the billions of reais that the parties take from the taxpayer to finance themselves.
The approved PEC frees the parties from all the fines and sanctions that weighed against them in court. According to a survey carried out by the Transparência Partidária group, the corrected value of fines can reach an exaggerated R$ 23 billion. Detail. The previous rule prohibited fines against parties from being paid with public money from the electoral fund. Now, this is allowed.
Insoluble divergences
The least that can be said of the text is that it is shameless in its intention to free politicians from punishment for non-compliance with the law. In addition to reinforcing the tax immunity of the parties, he creates a refinancing program beyond comradely, aimed at paying the debts accumulated by the parties over the years. Hanging bills, to begin with, are exempt from any fines or interest. They will be adjusted only for inflation and paid over 180 smooth installments. That is: 15 years!
calm! It’s not over yet. To pay these bills, the law brings back a practice that seemed banned from Brazilian politics: the possibility of legal entities making donations to political parties. It is written there, in all letters: “It is allowed to raise funds from legal entities by political party, in any instance, to settle debts with suppliers contracted or assumed until August 2015”.
The justifications for this little shame are the simplest possible. The text says: “Many of the party entities had difficulty adjusting to the new constitutional command (which fixed the volume of resources to be allocated to the campaigns of women and black people), as a result of the lack of another rule that presented the guidelines or a greater elucidation on the matter pertinent to the distribution of these quotas. It was not known for sure, in the midst of the electoral process, whether the count of the rule would have its federal scope or if it should be complied with by the parties at the national level.” If anyone can explain the doubt that may exist between “federal scope” and “national scope”, please help us to clarify.
And more: “Many parties, acting in good faith and with the greatest effort to ensure that the rules were complied with, found themselves inadequate after the electoral period, due to many changes in the registration of candidacy throughout the country.” That was fine: the deputies did not need to convince anyone, but themselves, of the reasons that led them to amnesty themselves from the penalties that led them to break a law that, in the beginning, had been approved by them. But to speak of “good faith” in a circumstance like this, frankly, sounds like a mockery to the citizens of this country.
The excuses presented above do not make any sense. Any citizen is always obliged to comply with the laws passed by Congress, even if he is harmed by them or is surprised by changes decided from the top down. This also applies to people and companies. It is only not valid for the politicians who had, according to what is written, “difficulty in adjusting to the new constitutional command” that they themselves voted.
And there’s more! Everyone knows that Brazilian politics has become a pit of polarization and that the left and the right are constantly exchanging accusations about responsibility for the country’s problems. But when it comes to freeing the parties from the penalties to which they were subject for having failed to comply with a law that their own members voted, there are no divergences. This becomes clear when looking at the names and parties of the hundred and odd deputies who signed as authors of PEC 9/2023. Almost all the parties with representation in the House are there. When it comes to seeking this kind of advantage, even radical opponents, such as the PT and the PL are capable of staying on the same side…
In addition to the consensus that is manifested around very few matters, another point is impressive in this story: the speed with which the decision was made. In a single night, the text went through two rounds of voting in the Chamber, without observing the interval that the rules provide for between the first (which ended with a score of 344 to 89 votes) and the second ballot (in which the text was approved by 338 to 83). This haste alone is enough to prove that the self-amnesty was already decided even before it was put to a vote and that the entire consultation with the plenary was nothing more than a staging made in an attempt to give legitimacy to the process.
It is necessary to make it clear that, at the time of the vote, the bench of the New party positioned itself against the text. The PSOL also expressed its opposition to the idea, even though it has one of its members, Deputy Chico Alencar, from Rio, among the authors of the PEC. Moreover, the result of the vote made it clear that, when it comes to defending one’s own interests, there are no insoluble divergences or insurmountable ideological barriers separating Brazilian politicians. At this time, everyone holds hands and forms a chain that drags everything in front of them! It is sad to admit, but this has been the keynote of Brazilian politics.
Pretend Vacation
To come into force, the PEC still needs to be approved by the Senate. As it is a Proposal for the Constitution – and not an ordinary law – it does not need to be submitted to the sanction of the President of the Republic. Therefore, it is not subject to a presidential veto.
On Friday, in an interview in São Paulo, the president of the Senate, Rodrigo Pacheco (PSD/MG) wanted to dodge the discussion – which, like it or not, is embarrassing for all politicians – and said that he is not committed to the urgency in the vote on self-amnesty. But, with all due respect, to imagine that Pacheco has a statesmanlike attitude and that he is willing to prevent the processing of a matter like this would be to expect a lot from a politician who, since he assumed the presidency of the Senate, has shown himself incapable of any gesture of greatness in defense of society.
It is unlikely, therefore, that the decision taken in the Chamber will be changed by the senators. After all, as much as the deputies, they have an interest in freeing the parties to which they are affiliated from the fines that, in the end, would mean transferring to the coffers of the Electoral Justice a part of the public money that they invoice as Party Fund and Electoral Fund. As happened in the Chamber, the most likely thing is that the issue will be hibernating in the committee in charge of analyzing it and that, all of a sudden, it will leave there to be put to a vote in the dead of any night, without society even having time to understand what is happening.
The vote on PEC 9/2023 only opens up a procedure that has been manifesting itself at various times in political activity in Brazil. It has been increasingly common for politicians to benefit from the decisions they themselves make or to find less and less creative ways to circumvent the norms that should guide their conduct. In this sense, the mid-year recess that they are taking from this week can be taken as an example.
Strictly speaking, the deputies and senators could not be going on vacation at this time. According to the rule issued by the Legislative Branch itself, the 15-day parliamentary recess in the middle of the year can only be granted after the approval of the Budgetary Guidelines Law – LDO – which will guide public spending for the following year. This was the way found, years ago, to force Congress to make a decision that, if there were no obligation, would be postponed until the last minute.
The parliamentarians, however, do not care about this formality. To get around the obligation, they do not assume that they are going on vacation. They will not be working for the next 15 days, but, for all intents and purposes, it is as if they were working. After August, when the LDO is voted on, they will officially go on vacation.
Abuse of prerogative
Attention! Attitudes like these are not limited to the Legislative Branch and, unfortunately, have been a recurring practice not only of Brazilian politicians, but also of members of the other branches. The Judiciary, for example, is lavish in creating tricks that multiply the salaries of magistrates to limits much higher than the constitutional ceiling.
For them, the salaries of any public servant, including benefits, cannot exceed the salaries of a minister of the Federal Supreme Court, which is currently R$ 46,366. According to a survey carried out last year based on data released by the country’s own Courts of Justice, more than half of Brazilian magistrates receive salaries well above this limit.
In the case of the Executive Branch, the problem is of a different nature. To begin with, the distance that separates what is promised during electoral campaigns and the decisions that are taken in the exercise of the mandate seems to be increasing. There are also frequent cases in which politicians abuse the prerogative to use the power conferred by the positions they occupy for the benefit of their own interests.
It is always good to make it clear that no one here is saying that left-wing politicians fall more into temptation than the right-wing crowd. What is being discussed here is something that seems to hover above ideologies, parties or the trajectory taken by politicians in general.
Politics is extremely important and the more society feels encouraged to participate in the process, the better. But the more the National Congress continues to approve measures that benefit its own members, while society works itself to death to keep its obligations up to date, disbelief will increase and politics runs the risk of becoming just a picture on the wall. It is necessary to prevent this from happening.
