From Honor Colorado they questioned the complicit silence of the opposition before the questionable surrender agreement of the Government of Mario Abdo Benítez with Brazil, when fixing the price of the Itaipu tariff, making up the defeat with a populist reduction in the price of the ANDE tariff for these election months.
Chartist deputy Pedro Alliana described the reduction of ANDE’s rate for four months as a populist and clearly electoral measure, after the Itaipu rate (with a decrease) with Brazil was finalized, this being something detrimental to our country.
“It is important that citizens know that with this agreement the country is going to lose 100 million dollars a year, and wanting to alleviate this situation, they speak of a 25% discount for a sector of the population for four months, and that it would cost about 40 million guaraníes, that’s why it ends in December, we see a populist and electoral issue,” he argued.
“The damage caused by this agreement with Brazil is terrible,” he said in an interview with radio Universo / Nación Media at the time of highlighting that due to this situation they requested an extraordinary session to hold a free debate in the plenary of the Chamber of Deputies, in addition of the interpellation to the director of Itaipu Binational.
The legislator maintained that in recent times the Honor Colorado movement has become the only opposition to the Government, and that it continues in the same line of conduct, even though they suffer persecution from the ruling party which it justly saved from impeachment in the past. .
On the other hand, he remarked that instead there is a complicit silence of the opposition and the media related to the ruling party. “Evidently the opposition has a governance pact, not to criticize the ruling party, and this is accompanied by requests for multi-million dollar loans to a government that does not demonstrate transparency of resources. There is talk of loans to pay salaries. In the years that I have been in politics, I do not remember that loans have been made to pay salaries and that shows the terrible administration of this government, ”he attacked.
THE LIES OF THE GOVERNMENT OF MARITO
For a year, the government of Mario Abdo Benítez considered the tariff reduction non-negotiable, qualifying said option as disastrous. Now, without a coherent explanation, he has turned 180° and maintains that the agreement with Brazil is “a great achievement”, described by experts on energy issues as one that compromises sovereignty.
With the tariff reduction of USD 22.60 KW/month, to 20.75, Brazil wins and Paraguay loses. ANDE will save 40 million dollars and Eletrobras, its Brazilian counterpart, 230 million. The glass was not left “half full”, as the government claims, but clearly unbalanced in favor of the neighboring country. Pedro Ferreira and Fabián Cáceres, former president and former manager of ANDE, respectively, agree on this assessment.
“For Jair Bolsonaro (president of Brazil) this is a success and for our country this seems sad to me because in four months of reduction we risk a negotiation for US$ 1,000 million per year”, highlighted former president Ferreira.
Of the USD 220 million that Mario Abdo claims to have obtained thanks to the reduction, 140 million destined for ANDE was an agreement that dates from the first semester of 2021 and that was not subordinated to the rate. By putting in the package of supposed “achievements” of the decrease, the country lost 140 million that could be used in other concepts.
The agreement establishes that ANDE will increase Itaipu’s power contracting by 20%. This had been the Brazilian demand that triggered the crisis of the bilateral act and that, in order to accept it, Mario Abdo said that Paraguayans should stop being “rogues and toll drivers.”
The 25% reduction in ANDE’s bill, from September to December (for those who pay up to G. 400,000) is a subsidy from the Paraguayan State, during electoral times, which will cost approximately 64 million dollars. This will absorb all the savings of 40 million and will mean a loss of 24 million for the state company.
Since Brazil buys 85% of Itaipu’s energy and we buy 15% of the US$2 billion, Brazil would keep US$1.7 billion and us US$300 million. In other words, instead of receiving US$1,000, we would be satisfied with only US$300 million.
