The proposal for amendment to the Constitution (PEC) of the armor, which prohibits the opening of criminal actions against deputies and senators without permission of Parliament, may favor corruption in the use of parliamentary amendments. The alert has been done by experts and organizations working with the fight against corruption.
The Movement to Combat Electoral Corruption (MCCE), which brings together several civil society entities, denounced, in a statement, that PEC strengthens impunity and weakens transparency, especially “by admitting the secret vote in decisions dealing with parliamentarians’ liability ”.
MCCE director Luciano Santos told the Brazil agency that the growth of money volumes of parliamentary amendments favored the increase in corruption in the country. By 2025, the federal budget allocated about R $ 50 billion for amendments, similar to the scheduled for 2026.
“We are clear that one is looking for exactly a shield because of these investigations into the amendments. It makes no sense to make this shield of politicians, especially knowing that there are several investigations ongoing,” said the expert.
Luciano argues that more control, transparency and traceability in the execution of these public resources are lacking.
“It is out that the control is coming. It is the Supreme who is demanding that Congress and the Executive can have practices and measures to prevent the deviations from the amendments from happening. You can not do a law where authorization needs to come from Congress. History shows that this does not work,” he said.
In recent years, parliamentary amendments have been targeted by various Federal Police (PF) operations and inquiries open in the Federal Supreme Court (STF) for lack of transparency in the use of these resources.
For lawyer and jurist Marco Aurélio de Carvalho, coordinator of the prerogative group, the great motivation for the approval of PEC lies in investigations on payments of these amendments.
“They are already shielded, somehow, due to lack of transparency. PEC, in fact, will bring more tranquility. It is almost one action between friends. Almost all, or much, is involved in suspicious actions in the payment of amendments. They will be interested in protecting each other,” says the lawyer.
Unfeasible the country
The coordinator of the Central of Amendments, a platform that gathers data on the execution of parliamentary amendments, Bruno Bondarovsky, told Agência Brasil that this PEC makes public money difficult amendment Be well applied.
“Transparency is already limited due to the current model, which sprays resources without proper control. Locative efficiency is low because there are few technical restrictions. If corruption investigations are limited, these amendments will be a drain that can make the country unfeasible,” he warned.
At the end of August, STF Minister Flávio Dino sent the PF investigate 964 amendments Individuals of special transfer parliamentarians, called “pix amendment”, which total R $ 694 million.
Parliamentary amendments have been the target of billionaire blocks. In December 2024, Dino suspended the Payment of R $ 4.2 billion in amendments on suspicions of irregularities.
This week, Dino suspended the transfer from “amendments pix” to nine municipalities. An audit of the Comptroller General of the Union (CGU) in ten cities did not find irregularity in a municipality.
The execution of parliamentary amendments is one of the main reasons for dispute between the Supreme and Congress. In March this year, Parliament approved new rules For amendments from STF guidelines, but critics point out that the changes were not enough to give transparency and traceability to resources.
In a statement, International Transparency, another organization that works with the theme of corruption, recalled that between 1998 and 2001, Congress barred 253 investigations, authorizing only one. At this time, the Parliament’s authorization rule for opening criminal actions against parliamentarians was in force.
“[Deputados e senadores] are averse to any type of transparency or control measurement [sob emendas parlamentares] And they are more concerned with the possibility of liability for deviations than the need to interrupt them. The urgency of the shield originates precisely in the advancement of investigations into these deviations, which already reach almost a hundred, ”said the entity.
In turn, the institute did not accept corruption stated that the PEC has the “obvious” claim to obtain impunity ensured by the law.
“What is proposed, from this ignominious initiative, is the creation of a true caste with a joking nickname of parliamentary prerogative for a noble group of untouchables, from people above good and evil, also facing the principle of constitutional isonomy,” the organization said.
Protect Parliament
Defenders of PEC 3 of 2021 state that the proposal aims to protect the exercise of the parliamentary mandate against improper interference of the judiciary and against alleged “political persecution,” as argued for opposition parliamentarians.
The PEC rapporteur in the House, Deputy Claudio Cajado (PP-BA), rejects the argument that the proposal limit criminal actions against parliamentarians.
“This is not a license for abuse of the exercise of the mandate, it is a protective shield of the defense of the parliamentary, the sovereignty of the vote and, above all, respect for the House of Representatives and the Senate,” he said.
Deputy Nikolas Ferreira (PL-MG) argued that the National Congress would not bar investigations against those who committed crimes.
“Those who commit a crime will pay, wow. It’s simple, we vote and we show that this house is against criminal,” said Nikolas during the session.
In the evaluation of MCCE’s director, Luciano Santos, the argument of parliamentarians is not valid because, when it was worth the rule of authorizing investigations against deputies and senators, almost all processes were barred.
“It is absolutely impossible to believe that this happens. We saw parliamentarians who were revoked by the judiciary and who depended on voting in Congress, and that it takes a long time and corporatism effectively protects. The self -protection there is huge,” he said.
