A new private report, paid out to the study of the agrarian specialist lawyer, Horace of Brum, “concluded” that the senator of Cabildo Abierto, Guido Manini Riosdoes not have land affected by the current colonization legislation, also exempting his wife, Irene Moreira, and her father, Roque Moreira.
The INC Board of Directors voted 4 to 1 to free Manini Ríos from all accusations, based on this study that would have cost US$10,000 (in agreement journalist Diego Martín Lemos), with the support of the four directors of the multicolor coalition, and a vote against Andrés Berterreche, who is a representative of the Broad Front.
Last November, a report from the law firm, convened by the INC itself, concluded that the lands in question have the characteristics to be affected by the current legislation on colonization, and that Manini and the Moreira had the status of settlers by consequence.
In June of this same year, a report by the INC’s Legal Counsel also found that the conditions were ripe to affirm that Manini Ríos, his wife, and his father-in-law were settlers. A previous report -for a total of three- also pointed in the same direction, but the INC Board preferred to ignore all of them to make room for the report purchased from Horacio de Brum’s study.
Horace de Brum, his political career and his report
The lawyer Horacio de Brum was hired to prepare the report that freed Manini Ríos from all guilt, going over three previous legal reports. He is a specialist in agrarian law, graduated from the Catholic University of Uruguay and has been a political activist in the past.
He is a descendant of former Colorado President Baltasar Brum, and his family has historically been linked to the Colorado Party, as he himself says in an interview with the portal diarioelpueblo.com.uy. “So I think there are two conjunctions, on the one hand, I was lucky to carry my father’s surname, with great pride, which has a remarkable family and political tradition in the party and, on the other hand, the maternal accompaniment that was really the one that It made me like politics”, de Brum stated in said interview dating from 2009. He has also been a representative for the Colorado Party, arriving for the sublemma 115 of Salto, between 2015 and 2020, according to the portal of the Parliament.
His report has been questioned precisely because of his political affiliation and because the Colorado Party, in which he has been a member, is part of the multicolored coalition that voted in favor of freeing Manini Ríos from accusations in all this controversy. Even from the Broad Front it is affirmed that de Brum is a member of the Cabildo Abierto, which further amplifies the controversy.
One of the critics is the Frente Amplista senator, José Bayardi. “Three reports from the Colonization Law report that Manini is a Colono. But the INC requested external advice from a lawyer and professor from the Catholic University (UCU) (De Brum) who was a substitute for deputy Eguiluz, elected by the Colorado Party and today integrates Cabildo Abierto. On the one hand, they should think about eliminating all the legal requirements of public bodies, which are supposed to defend the interests of the bodies. It is difficult for a private lawyer to defend the interest of an organization”, commented Bayardi.
And he added: “But hey, the 4 votes that with that report defined that Manini is not a Colono, would have continued asking for reports until they could grab hold of something that would give them grounds for their vote. Another decision would have shaken the multicolored coalition. How was that that the political cannot be above the legal?
At least until 2019, he was still a member of the PC. This is how you realize a tweet of
Deborah Hollander, a red militant from Carolina Ache’s 919 list, who published on February 4 of that year: “Planning what’s to come with @CarolinaAche @fran_ibe and Horacio De Brum!!!”.
