By Maria Carolina Marcello
BRASILIA (Reuters) – The president of the National Congress, Senator Rodrigo Pacheco (PSD-MG), said on Friday that there is no risk of refusing the results of the October elections or of a coup, and also assessed that the Armed Forces will respect the electoral outcome.
In an interview with international agencies, the senator evaluated as positive the participation of international observers in the October electoral process, as well as the Armed Forces in the transparency commission created by the Superior Electoral Court (TSE). He defended, however, that it is only up to the Electoral Court the task of counting the votes.
“With the institutions of Brazil functioning, with society, with democracy already fully assimilated, I don’t see the slightest environment for a refusal of the electoral result, much less a coup”, said Pacheco when asked about the possibility.
“The Armed Forces are constitutional institutions present in the lives of Brazilians, we are proud of them”, he said. “I have no doubt about the maturity and role of the Armed Forces in the search for consensus and respect for the electoral result.”
Pacheco also denied that there had been an error in the TSE’s initiative to invite the Armed Forces to participate in the discussion on the transparency of elections, reinforced that it is up to the Judiciary to give the last word in the mediation of conflicts and defended that respect for this Power should be ” urgently restored”.
For him, it is exclusively up to the Judiciary, more specifically the TSE, to count the elections, despite statements by President Jair Bolsonaro, who has been insisting that the Armed Forces carry out a parallel count of votes. The president has been coming for some time, and without presenting evidence that corroborates his suspicions, questioning the reliability of the voting process, the security of the electronic voting machines and the inviolability of the system.
“The Executive Branch has candidates in these elections, and therefore interested parties. We, from the Legislature, have a number of candidates too, and consequently interested parties. So, it is up to the country’s Judiciary, even with a very significant structure, the role of, with exemption –since it will not contest the elections–, of taking care of the elections”, pondered Pacheco.
“This trust in the Electoral Justice, I think it is something that is very important for every society to have, because it has reasonability, it has logic”, he defended.
CHAOTIC
As president of the Legislature, the senator will have the task of swearing in the elected president in October, and said he believes that “there will be a formal inauguration ceremony”.
Defender of a reinforcement of the dialogue to face the tension between the institutions, the president of the Congress admitted that this is one of the worst moments of the country since the redemocratization and that the judiciary is the target of attacks.
For him, both Bolsonaro, with his positions “frontally” against members of the judiciary or judicial decisions, and the Judiciary, must play their role.
In the case of Justice, the parliamentarian believes that there could be, on the initiative of the Power itself, a reflection on its actions to avoid conflicts. He cited the adoption of monocratic decisions as one of the points that can generate friction with the other Powers. He also hailed a future discussion of the Supreme Court’s powers as “improvement” as positive.
When commenting on Bolsonaro’s speeches and attitudes, he considered it “misguided” and “wrong” that he, like any other citizen, suggests the possibility of breaching a court decision.
“It would be chaotic for us to have a state in which people no longer respect judicial decisions,” said the president of the Senate, without referring directly, in this speech, to Bolsonaro.
Regarding an interview with Bolsonaro released this Friday in which the president accuses him of acting partially in the midst of the institutional crisis, Pacheco denied having any preference or personal positioning for a certain power or authority.
“The only partiality I allow myself to have is in the defense of the Power I represent, which is the Legislative Power. And also, of course, in defense of democracy and the rule of law”, said the parliamentarian.
According to him, the defense of democratic principles ends up resulting in the defense of the prerogatives of the Judiciary, without this necessarily implying partiality. He also insisted on saying that the positions adopted by him have institutional support and that he acts as president of Congress.
“There was not necessarily a defense of the judiciary on our part, but a defense of positions and issues that end up benefiting the judiciary: the defense of the judiciary’s freedom to judge… the prerogative of the judiciary to take care of the elections”, he explained.
“It is not a defense of the Judiciary against the Executive Branch. It is the defense of the Constitution… we have to affirm what the Constitution prescribes, what is best for Brazil, which is the defense of democracy and the rule of law and this ends up flowing into the defense of what is a prerogative of the Judiciary, nothing other than that.”
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