The National Executive Committee of the Brazilian PPS (Popular Socialist Party) decided, to file motions against the lawmakers cited in the reports submitted to the Chairs of the two houses by the parliamentary investigation commissions (CPIs).
Their motions were presented to the Councils of Ethics and Parliamentary Decorum in the Chamber of Deputies and the Senate. They took this decision after consulting with the party’s representatives in the National Congress and the heads of state committees
According to the president of the PPS, federal deputy Roberto Freire (Pernambuco state), the party will not tolerate the creation of obstacles serving to thwart the investigations and sanctions against lawmakers “involved in the scandal of monthly allowance payments [‘mensalão’] and in processes of corruption cited in the reports of the CPIs.”
“There will be no papering over. Nobody should imagine that what the CPIs sent to the governing bodies of the Chamber and the Senate will be put on the back burner. There isn’t going to be any deal,” Freire affirmed.
He explained that the party’s decision is mainly an effort to prevent any blanket agreement in the Congress intended to “avoid punishing the lawmakers who are the object of accusations, as well as attempts to impede and postpone the investigations and penalties.”
Freire said that his party, as a political force, will not allow the Chairs of the Chamber and the Senate to shelve the accusations.
“If the Chairs do not forward right away to the Councils of Ethics the names of the lawmakers cited by the CPIs for processes to be initiated, the PPS will immediately file motions, based on information provided by the CPIs, to install trials to revoke these lawmakers’ mandates,” Freire remarked.
The internal rules of the Chamber determine that only the Chair of the House or a political party can file a motion in the Council of Ethics and Parliamentary Decorum proposing the opening of a process to revoke a lawmaker’s mandate.
The Chair of the House informed that the CPIs are not authorized to submit requests to revoke a lawmaker’s mandate directly to the Council. The CPIs can only propose to the Chair that it file such a motion with the Council of Ethics.
Agência Brasil