According to Sanguinetti, Cosse told him that Colorados are exempt from tax

“The first thing is that I don’t think the debt really exists, because all parties, by constitutional and legal provisions, are exempt from paying the contribution,” gave the former president when asked this Thursday by The Observer.

According to Sanguinetti, in the case of the Colorados, a formal effort had never been made for the departmental government to recognize this situation, until July of last year. On October 25, he held a meeting on the subject with Mayor Carolina Cosse.

“There everything was very clear”, the former president noted. In the meeting, he said, the general secretary of the Intendancy, Olga Othegui, also participated. “They told us that they had studied the issue and that they recognized our right,” she said. Also that the administration assumed that the party headquarters included several padrones and that they all formed a unit.

“Just as clearly, they told us that our headquarters on Belloni Avenue were not considered to be included in the exoneration,” he explained, about the place where the old Piedras Blancas Cinema operated for years.

On the table is a debt that exceeds US$ 5 million. In November, the Colorado Party submitted a document to the Municipality of Montevideo asking to be allowed to remedy a “unintentional omission” and thus be able to access a benefit of the tax exemption that could have been receiving for almost half a century. From the July 31, 1972 is in force a decree approved by the Departmental Board that protects political parties to avail themselves of this possibility.

Sanguinetti, however, admitted the difficulty that the fact that these goods are not in the official name of the party represents for the Colorados.

“It is a long story, which dates back to the time of the government of (Gabriel) Terra,” he said. In any case, the former president warned about a principle of fiscal reality: “The Colorado Party has been working there for 80 years, officially, before the Electoral Court and with public notoriety,” remarked.

The mansion on Andrés Martínez Trueba street was never in the name of the Colorado Party. It was acquired through a collection in 1942. The then leader César Batlle Pacheco appeared as the owner. According to Sanguinetti, Mayor Cosse herself acknowledged at the meeting that “no one doubted where the red headquarters was.”

The former president said he was surprised by the delay of the administration in officially recognizing the tax exemption. “I know that a resolution had been projected,” Indian. “I do not imagine that this is the result of a persecutory spirit, and I have no doubt that the resolution will be issued.”

The situation occurs in a context in which the Colorado inmate perceives a “very hostile bond” with Cosse, as had not happened in previous administrations. Thus, through the negotiations that took place in relation to to the city hall loan with the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB) there were aediles, as far as he could know The Observer, who weighed their vote based on the debt and the possible trial.

Sanguinetti separated the debts of the party headquarters from the embargo that the administration locked for unpaid fines for poorly placed political posters, amounting to US$250,000.

“The infraction is true, and not only of the colorados”, pointed. There, although there was an exhortation to comply with the “We are not responsible for what some group or a loose leader does that we do not know who it was.”

Sanguinetti noticed that there is important jurisprudence regarding this “game of responsibilities” and said he trusts that the Justice will confirm it. He also said he thought that a general level amnesty should be sought, with certain requirements, which would contribute to a better relationship between the administration and the parties in the future.

“We are talking about parties and freedoms, not about businesses that abuse for their own benefit”, concluded. “They are different values ​​and practices.”