(EFE) The president of Brazil, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, said on Monday that he trusts that Cuba and Venezuela will settle their debts with the Brazilian development bank and blamed his predecessor, Jair Bolsonaro, for the late payments of those countries .
“I am sure that in our government these countries will pay because they are all friendly countries of Brazil and they will certainly pay the debt they have with the Bndes (National Bank for Economic and Social Development),” Lula said at the inauguration ceremony. of the new head of the state financial institution, in Rio de Janeiro.
According to the latest official data from September of last year, overdue debts in Bndes financing for goods and services projects in Venezuela reached 682 million dollars, while in Cuba they reached 227 million.
Lula came out today in defense of the Brazilian development bank, which he said was “the victim of many lies” and “very serious defamations”.
The Bndes financing for works in other countries in the region, which was granted to the Brazilian companies that carried out the projects, was used as an electoral weapon by the far-right led by Bolsonaro to attack Lula in the elections last October.
Lula came out today in defense of the Brazilian development bank, which he said was “the victim of many lies” and “very serious defamations” during the elections in which he emerged victorious against Bolsonaro.
He insisted that the Bndes “never gave money to countries friendly to the Government” and did “finance engineering services from Brazilian companies for projects in 15 countries in Latin America and the Caribbean between 1998 and 2017.”
This period includes the governments of Fernando Henrique Cardoso (1995-2002), the first two terms of Lula (2003-2010), as well as the administration of Dilma Rousseff (2011-2016).
Lula also defended that the Bndes is recovering everything it financed, although he acknowledged that “there are some contracts in arrears, although they are all covered by guarantees,” and blamed Bolsonaro for the delay in payment of some countries.
“Let’s be frank, the countries that did not pay, be it Cuba or Venezuela, it is because the (then) president (Bolsonaro) decided to cut international relations with those countries so as not to charge and be able to accuse them” of not paying, said the president.
“Let’s be frank, the countries that did not pay, be it Cuba or Venezuela, it is because the (then) president (Bolsonaro) decided to cut international relations,” Lula said.
Lula also denied that during his first two terms he favored “half a dozen Brazilian companies” in Bndes financing, which were later marred by corruption scandals.
“At the end of my government, 480 of the 500 largest companies operating in Brazil had banking relations with the Bndes, public and private companies from various sectors,” he said.
For all this, he asked to “stop lying” in relation to the Brazilian development bank, which he hopes that under the command of former minister Aloizio Mercadante, give priority to the “micro and medium entrepreneurs” of the country.
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