The government () issued an ordinance this Tuesday (10) to resume payment of parliamentary amendments, after five months of crisis between the Powers and threats from Congress to block the Executive’s spending cut package.
The new rules were published under the justification of adapting the standards to the recent decision of the STF (Supreme Federal Court) on the subject, but the text could open up loopholes for congressmen to circumvent the transparency of the amendments.
Parliamentarians told the Sheetsubject to the fear that the new rules will make it impossible to pay for parliamentary amendments by the end of the year. Party leaders threaten to delay the vote on the government’s spending cut package as retaliation for the changes to the amendments.
The government leadership in Congress estimates that the ordinance should release R$6.4 billion in bench and committee amendments. The value may be even higher with the resumption of payment for individual amendments and the “Pix” modality.
The text published by allows commission amendments to be paid when any parliamentarian identifies themselves as requesting the allocation of the money, including party leaders.
The identification of the sponsors of the commission amendments, which are approved jointly, is a requirement of the Supreme Court to release the money. This year, Congress allocated R$15.5 billion for this type of funding.
The section could open a loophole so that parliamentarians who are not the real sponsors of a given amendment can claim to be responsible for the money — and thus guarantee the release of resources before December 31st.
This was a suggestion discussed among Congress leaders, behind the scenes, in August. In last week’s decision, the STF minister highlighted that it will not be accepted for a party leader to claim responsibility for the amendments of colleagues.
“After all, it would constitute a constitutional and semantic incompatibility for the ‘committee amendment’ to be transformed into a ‘party leader amendment'”, says Dino in the decision.
The minister states, in the vote, that the “nominal identification of the requesting parliamentarian(s)” was a requirement for the release of resources. “If the origin and destination of the amendments are identified and published, with regard to the year 2024 and previous years, execution is possible, with the Executive Branch being responsible for the relevant measures.”
Another excerpt that was included in the government ordinance defines that the “Pix” amendments for the health area committed until the day of the STF’s decision, on December 3, should not be subject to the new rules stipulated by the Supreme Court.
Dino defined that amendments for the health area will only be released if they meet the technical guidelines and criteria defined by the (Unified Health System) and established by the Bipartite and Tripartite Inter-Management Commissions.
“Compliance with this requirement must be assessed by the federal manager prior to the release of the resource, and failure to comply constitutes a technical impediment to execution”, says Dino’s decision.
The president of the Chamber, Arthur Lira (PP-AL), said that he did not read the ordinance published by the government. He criticized the Supreme Court’s decision to define new rules for amendments that were not provided for in the law approved by Congress and sanctioned by Lula.
“We have an approved law that was not declared unconstitutional, sanctioned by the Executive, with the minister’s decision a little different from what was approved. So, that is the dilemma. The ordinance, if it did not come to resolve this, has no value” , he said.
The ordinance is signed by ministers Fernando Haddad (Finance), Simone Tebet (Planning), Esther Dweck (Management) and Alexandre Padilha (Institutional Relations). The text defines a series of rules for the release of amendments under the justification of adapting the federal government’s standards to the requirements imposed by the Supreme Court.
With the ordinance, the “Pix” amendments can be implemented again. Recipients of resources must submit a work plan by December 31 with details on how the money will be used.
The Supreme Court had set a deadline of 60 days for the presentation of this document. The government decided to shorten the deadline until the end of the month, and should present an opinion on the work plans at the beginning of February 2025.
Committee amendments and the remainder of the rapporteur’s amendments will be released by each ministry as the parliamentarians requesting the resources are identified.
The government also defined, following the demands of the STF, that NGOs benefiting from the resources must provide transparency on their websites about the use of money from parliamentary amendments since 2020 before receiving new resources.
In the Senate, there is discomfort not only with the freezing of the money itself, but also with the tone of Dino’s decisions. In the opinion of a Senate cardinal, the Supreme Court minister leaves it open that there is corruption in the use of money and places all congressmen in a “common grave”.
Senators also view the government’s promise to release dammed resources by the end of the year with suspicion. Even with the ordinances that should facilitate the transfer of money, the predominant assessment is that there is no more time to actually pay what has already been indicated.
The government leader in Congress, senator Randolfe Rodrigues (Rede-AP), stated this Tuesday that the government will do “everything possible and impossible” to honor all payments by the end of the year. Randolfe also said he understood that Dino’s decision this Monday caused “a problem with the headline and misunderstanding of the content”.
“The enforceable norm to give force to the ordinance makes it clear and provides the necessary peace of mind for the execution of the terms of yesterday’s decision [segunda] of Minister Flávio Dino”, he said. “This is the challenge we have, to guarantee the execution [das emendas] until December 31st. We’re going to work on that.”
A draft of the ordinance text was circulated among parliamentarians on Monday (9). Lula received the presidents of the Senate, Rodrigo Pacheco (PSD-MG), and the Chamber, Arthur Lira, at the Palácio do Planalto, to guarantee his intention to pay for the amendments and ask for efforts in voting on the spending package this year.
The final document published this Tuesday was leaner compared to the previous version. An excerpt that detailed rules on the accountability of beneficiary NGOs was removed, maintaining only the determination expressed in Dino’s decision regarding transparency on the website.
In addition, other devices were created that could become redundant with the magistrate’s decision. There was an article, for example, that determined the suspension of new transfers and the determination of civil and criminal liability if the rules were not respected.
Although this is already included in the STF’s determination, the government ordinance does not mention civil and criminal liability.
It was also said, initially, that the complete cycle of inspection and approval of amendment accounts would be under the responsibility of the TCU (Federal Audit Court) — which was also already included in Dino’s decision.
On Monday night (9), the president of the STF, countered parliamentarians and said that Flávio Dino’s decision on amendments fully follows the agreement reached between the three Powers in August.
“Regarding the Budget issue, I myself organized a meeting in my office and I am convinced that Minister Flávio Dino’s decision is in accordance with what was agreed,” Barroso told reporters.
He was referring to the meeting between the Powers that took place on August 20th. To mitigate the crisis after the blocking of parliamentary amendments, representatives of Congress, the government and the ministers of the Supreme Court reached an agreement on “transparency, traceability and correction criteria”.
“[A corte] intervened to say that it needs traceability, program definition, control. But the amount is a political issue. It is not the role of the Supreme Court to define how much the amount will be”, he added.
