2024-07-17 10:00:12
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Brazil is preparing for the most expensive local elections in its history as political parties and congressional leaders divide up ever-larger swathes of the public budget, posing a governance crisis for President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva.
Politicians have spent 4.9 billion Brazilian reais ($900 million) of public funds out of their own pockets to campaign ahead of municipal elections in October. The electoral court is paying for the logistics of the elections separately.
The allocation is more than double the 2 billion Brazilian reais spent on local races in 2020 and is equal to the total spending on the 2022 presidential, gubernatorial and state legislative elections.
The 4.9 billion reais exceeds the 3.7 billion reais annual budget of Brazil’s environment ministry, whose main responsibilities include stopping illegal deforestation, gold mining and land grabbing in the Amazon rainforest.
Currently, the Brazilian government is under tremendous pressure to cut costs due to growing market concerns about Brazil’s fiscal direction.
The ballooning budgets for election campaigns in Brazil’s 5,500 municipalities are another example of how lawmakers and politicians are extracting huge sums from public coffers, a practice that critics and analysts say empowers parliament at the expense of the president. There are also concerns about transparency and how the money is spent.
“The balance of power has shifted towards Congress,” said Bruno Carraza, a professor at the Dom Cabral Foundation. “Congressmen are less and less dependent on the president for political spoils. [funding] Fight for the interests of local constituencies.”
Lawmakers defended the allocation as part of the democratic process. Zeca Dirceu of Lula’s leftist Workers’ Party said last year: “Election fund resources are essential for the implementation of democracy. We are talking about 0.2 percent of state revenue. So it is reasonable. Municipal elections are very expensive and important for democracy.”
Another example of the growing influence of MPs is their control over public budgets through the allocation of discretionary allowances for investment in their constituencies.
In the past, the allocation of these funds was largely determined by the executive branch. However, over the past decade, lawmakers have seized on various weaknesses in government to give themselves the power to allocate the funds.
Today, lawmakers have the power to add millions of dollars in allowances to the federal budget — and must pay them.
Under Lula, these allowances accounted for about 22% of the government’s discretionary budget, or about $8 billion a year, according to consultancy Prospectiva. Under Jair Bolsonaro, they account for about 33%.
“Congress has significantly increased its control over budget spending. [in the past decade]“This gives it autonomy,” said Marina Pontes, a political analyst at Prospectiva.
“The allowance is constitutionally mandated. The problem is not the mechanism but the size of it.”
Lula has expressed anger at the situation, saying it undermines the leftist president’s ability to negotiate with Brazil’s right-wing-dominated Congress.
“The stark truth is … Congress has too much power,” the president said in a radio interview last month. “The executive branch’s ability to execute the budget has diminished. That’s real, and the whole world knows it.”
Local elections are scheduled for two rounds in October to elect mayors and city council members. Opinion polls are often seen as a barometer of the president’s popularity.
But they are also an important means for political parties to build local influence and electoral machinery ahead of national elections in 2026.
Karaza noted that although “this year’s local elections will be held in smaller regions, requiring less logistical and marketing expenditures,” public finance expenditures will be the same as for the 2022 national elections.
Brazil set up a public electoral fund in 2017 after its Supreme Court banned corporate donations in the wake of the long-running “Car Wash” corruption scandal.
The funds, which are distributed to political parties based on their performance in the last national election and the number of seats they hold in Congress, are supposed to be used only for electoral campaigns, but misuse is common and rarely sanctioned.
A common tactic is to field fake candidates who do not contest the elections but instead remit the cash they receive to the scheme’s architects.
The fund grew to 4.9 billion reais this year from 1.7 billion reais in 2018, as lawmakers approved an increase during annual budget negotiations.
Additional reporting by Beatriz Langella
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