President-elect Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva will resume his transition agenda next week to begin discussing the nomination of ministers. This statement was made by the coordinator of the thematic groups of the transition team, Aloizio Mercadante.
The coordinator also informed that a preliminary report on the work of each thematic group (GT) of the transition will be presented on the 30th, and should already contain a suggestion for repealing norms and evaluating public administration structures. A more detailed assessment of the government’s programs should be delivered on December 11th.
“The working groups will prepare suggestions, which will later be reviewed by the appointed minister and which will have to be agreed with the President of the Republic. So, this is a process. We will wait for this path so that we are sure of what has to be revoked”, said the coordinator. Earlier, the former judge and former governor of Maranhão, Flávio Dino (PSB), who is part of the Justice and Public Security working group for the transition, stated that he should propose the repeal of decrees that make possession, carrying and registration of weapons and ammunition more flexible.
Defense
Mercadante was questioned by journalists about the delay in announcing the members of the Defense working group, the only one of the 31 WGs announced so far that did not have its composition defined.
“From the Defense WG, I think we’re going to have an excellent composition, but we’re just going to hit the hammer with the president. As he traveled, he had a heavy schedule, an extraordinary repercussion of his speech [no Egito], let’s wait, it makes no difference. It is a secular institution, organized diagnosis, it has no major concerns regarding this agenda. You may have some occasional questions. There is an institutional problem, the role of the Armed Forces, the relationship with the Constitution, but this is not exactly a topic for the working group. We’ll come up with a good solution.”
Team
Mercadante, who was a PT government minister, gave a presentation on the work of the 30 thematic groups formed for the transition. So far, 285 people have been incorporated into the team, the vast majority of volunteers and requested public servants, and 13 appointed to commissioned positions provided for in the legislation, in addition to the general coordinator, vice-president-elect Geraldo Alckmin (PSB). The transition team is entitled to appoint up to 50 people to paid positions. However, according to Mercadante, not all of them should be filled in, and the idea is to use part of the resources with positions for funding activities, such as paying for tickets for volunteer specialists.
Budget
Mercadante criticized the lack of resources in the 2023 Budget for several areas, such as road maintenance and health. “The DNIT [Departamento Nacional de Infraestrutura de Transportes] has the lowest nominal budget in its history. We had 63 breakpoints [de rodovias] in Minas Gerais, two bridges that collapsed in the Amazon and have no maintenance resources. There are 60,000 kilometers of roads under the responsibility of the federal government”, he warned.
He also cited insufficient resources for cancer treatment in the public network, in addition to the number of elective surgeries that were postponed due to the covid-19 pandemic. The coordinator of the transition work groups also mentioned the lack of textbooks for basic education students. “How are you going to start a school year with 12 million children without a textbook?”, he asked.
Bolsa Familia
Yesterday (16), the transition team presented a draft of the Constitutional Amendment Proposal (PEC) for exclude the Bolsa Família program permanently from the spending cap rule, estimated at R$ 175 billion for next year. The measure would make it possible to maintain the minimum amount of BRL 600 for the Bolsa Família program, currently known as Auxílio Brasil, in addition to establishing an additional amount of BRL 150 per child under 6 years of age for each beneficiary. That’s a campaign promise from the president-elect. In addition, if approved, the PEC would open up budget space within the ceiling of approximately R$ 105 billion, which could be used to recompose resources in other areas, such as health and a real increase in the minimum wage.
