Bolsonaro's Big Commitment to Revive the Economy Progresses in Congress

RIO DE JANEIRO.- The project of
pension reform led by the Government of
Jair Bolsonaroconsidered essential to revive
economy of
Brazillast night, took another step forward which was approved in a second round by the Chamber of Deputies, where he obtained 370 votes for and 124 votes against.

At present, the proposed constitutional amendment will be forwarded to the Senate, where it will also have to be ratified by two votes to obtain the final sanction.

Already in July, Bolsonaro
a major victory had been won with the approval of the reform in a first round with 379 deputies in favor and 131 against; Although some votes were lost last night, the new result clearly indicates that parliamentary support is strong and that no major difficulties are expected in the Senate.

After today, the Chamber of Deputies has finished defining some details, the initiative will be forwarded to the Senate Committee on the Constitution and Justice and, once it is expressed, it will open the debate in 20 days in session Plenary of the Upper House. , who will then carry out the two votes necessary for approval. In case of modification of the text, the project will be sent back to the deputies where it will have to be voted again in two teams.

Designed by the neoliberal team of the Minister of Economy, Paulo Guedes,
The pension reform aims to end Brazil's growing budget deficit and restore investor confidence in the sustainable growth of its economy, which, with the recession of 2015-2016, had lost 7% of its gross domestic product and these two in recent years it has developed at a mediocre rate of 1%; For this year, projections even indicate a growth of only 0.8%. The project establishes a minimum retirement age of 65 for men and 62 for women in the public and private sectors, a condition that does not exist at this time. In addition, he adds that in order to collect the benefit in full, contributions must have been paid for 40 years for men and 35 for women, although from 20 and 15 years of service respectively, a retirement can be imposed. partial.

The reform is the Bolsonaro government's big commitment to start cleaning up the economy. Initially, the savings it estimated were about $ 270,000 million in 10 years, but after the changes to the project, they were reduced to $ 235,000 million. One of the points that emerged from the project was the integration of an individual capitalization system into the current general distribution scheme.

The debate in the Chamber of Deputies was very lively, but the government had the essential support of the president of the badembly, Rodrigo Maia, of the right-wing Democratic Party (DEM), allied with the Liberal Social Party (PSL), party official and novice, who He revealed how much he was very rambling to push the initiative for himself. The internal struggles in the PSL and the interference of Bolsonaro himself, who had criticized the way of acting the "old policy", repeatedly threatened to derail the project, but Maia was successful to advance it.

"The government is now closer, this proximity, when we begin the dialogue and the MPs bring their demands, helps us," said the speaker of the House of Representatives last night.

For his part, Senate Speaker Davi Alcolumbre, also from the DEM, said he hoped the final approval of the reform would be reached by the end of September.

The controversy of his son ambbadador

Thus, all eyes will be turned to the next weeks in the Senate, not only for the debate on the pension reform, but also for the possible approval of the deputy Eduardo Bolsonaro – one of the three children of the president – as ambbadador to the United States. The president launched the controversial proposal a month ago, but has not yet made his official nomination, although the Trump administration has welcomed this idea, which would serve to strengthen direct alignment between the current administrations of Brazil and the United States.

Like any other appointment of ambbadadors, Eduardo Bolsonaro, chairman of the House of Representatives External Relations Commission, is to be appointed diplomatic representative in Washington. It will first go through an inquiry to the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, then submit to a plenary vote, where you will need the support of a simple majority of senators present.

In order to guarantee a sufficient number of votes, the President has already made some gestures to the senators and even indicated that he would be ready to transfer to Alcolumbre the appointment of two persons to vacant positions of the administrative council of economic defense (Cade) . Since the opposition, these movements have already been criticized as a vote buying.