Chamber approves basic text that dilutes ministries of the Environment and Indigenous Peoples – Internacional

2023-06-01 05:04:00

The Chamber of Deputies approved this Wednesday (31) the basic text of a provisional measure to restructure the government of Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, diluting the power of the Environment and Indigenous Peoples ministries and weakening the climate promises made by the president.

The basic text, approved by 337 votes to 125 and which will be analyzed by the Senate this Thursday, changes the attributions of several ministries and represents a new defeat for the Lula government in Congress.

With the changes approved, the Ministry of Indigenous Peoples will lose one of its main attributions: responsibility for the demarcation of new indigenous lands, which will now be supervised by the Ministry of Justice.

The Ministry of the Environment, on the other hand, will lose its powers over the registration of rural lands, which is fundamental in monitoring and combating illegal deforestation, and over the management of water resources.

It was a day of agony for the Lula government, which despite having suffered its second legislative setback in 24 hours on environmental matters, avoided an even greater defeat.

Since the morning, the government has been trying to avoid total rejection of the provisional measure (MP) that validates the composition of 37 ministries determined by Lula in January and valid until June 1st.

Failure to vote on the MP or its rejection would automatically mean a drastic shrinkage of the current structure to the government model of former President Jair Bolsonaro, with 23 portfolios. The Ministry of Indigenous Peoples, for example, would be eliminated.

Lula spoke by telephone with the president of the Chamber of Deputies, Arthur Lira (PP-AL), to try to have the project, key to the composition of the government, analyzed this Wednesday.

Lira told the press that there is “a problem in the government”, arguing that the recent PT defeats in the legislature are due to “the lack or absence of political articulation”.

The president of the Chamber conveyed to Lula the discomfort of the parliamentarians with the government.

“There is widespread dissatisfaction among deputies and senators,” he said.

This Wednesday’s vote marked the second legislative defeat of the government’s environmental agenda, after deputies approved on Tuesday a bill limiting the demarcation of indigenous lands, a campaign promise by Lula after several years of paralysis.

The initiative, which must be approved by the Senate, establishes that the lands reserved for the original communities must be restricted to those occupied by indigenous people at the time of the enactment of the current Constitution, in 1988.

The time frame compromises the rights of indigenous peoples, whose territories act as barriers against deforestation, according to environmentalists.

– Lack of governance –

Upon assuming power in January, Lula appointed Marina Silva, an emblematic figure in the fight against climate change, to head the Ministry of the Environment, and gave indigenous leader Snia Guajajara the reins of the new Ministry of Indigenous Peoples.

But the international optimism generated by these nominations collided with Lula’s political reality, which, despite ceding some ministries and high positions to center-right parties, was unable to guarantee a legislative majority to vote on important agendas for the government.

“It’s not that his support base is disjointed, that Lula has no base in Congress” beyond the left and center-left parties that supported his candidacy, said political analyst Leandro Gabiati, director of Dominium consultancy.