The Association for the Defense of Electric Energy Consumers of the Northern Region went to court and requested that the contribution of R$450 million to the company not be authorized before Aneel regulates MP 1,232
A consumer association went to court to ask for intervention from the Aneel (National Electric Energy Agency) in Amazonas Energy and the non-granting of a provisional decision (injunction) that the company requests to receive R$450 million if the MP (Provisional Measure) is not regulated 1,232 of 2024. Here is the full of the petition (PDF – 7 MB).
“The analysis of this complex issue cannot be subject to pressure for quick decisions, without detailed studies and broad justification, compromising the safety of the electricity sector and penalizing consumers”, stated Asdecen (Association for the Defense of Consumers of Electric Energy in the Northern Region).
The organization also accused what it called procedural fraud allegedly committed by the company, claiming that it filed multiple lawsuits with similar content in different courts, with the intention of choosing the most favorable judgment.
“It appears to us that there is an attempt to manipulate the process. The attempt to choose the judge who will conduct the case, through successive withdrawals and re-filings, points to a violation of the principle of the natural judge, provided for in art. 5, LIII, of the Federal Constitution, subverting the legal order and compromising the integrity of the justice system.”he stated.
Therefore, Asdecen requests that the OAB (Brazilian Bar Association) and the Public Prosecutor’s Office investigate the aforementioned evidence and order Amazonas Energia to pay a fine of 10% of the value of the case.
UNDERSTAND
Aneel has accused Amazonas Energia of bad faith litigation – acting procedurally in a reprehensible manner and violating legal obligations. The regulatory agency says the energy distributor filed four nearly identical lawsuits in SJAM (Judicial Section of Amazonas) within minutes of each other. According to the agency, this constitutes an attempt to have the case fall into the hands of a preferred judge. Read the full of the document (PDF – 56 kB).
The actions refer to an injunction to secure R$450 million for the company if Aneel does not regulate the MP before it expires on October 12. The MP is seen as the salvation of the distributor that provides an inefficient service and has received government resources since 2018 to maintain its operations in the state in the North region.
After Aneel’s statement, Judge Ricardo Augusto de Sales ordered the redistribution of the Amazonas Energia action and requested an investigation into failures in the system that forwards cases to judges. “In view of the arguments and documents presented, a new and free distribution of the case files should be promoted, ensuring compliance with the constitutional principle of the natural judge”wrote Sales. Read the full of the decision (PDF – 107 kB).
Since it was a branch of Eletrobras, Amazonas Energia already had a loss-making operation. When the company was acquired by the group Oliveira Energy In 2018, it was agreed that the company would receive around R$2 billion from the federal government over 4 years to maintain the service while implementing management that would bring efficiency, which did not happen.
The government aid ended before the group was able to make the company stand on its own two feet, and the result was that the group now wants to sell Amazonas Energia. Aware of the problem, the federal government issued a provisional measure that extends the benefit until a change of control, subject to an assessment by Aneel. Whoever buys the distributor is entitled to the benefit for 12 years.
The J&F group presented a proposal to acquire Amazonas Energia, but the Poder360 found that Aneel’s technical department is likely to reject the plan presented by the Batista brothers’ company. With an imminent rejection, Amazonas Energia is left without a buyer on the horizon and is trying to cling to the MP to seize the resources.
Given the distributor’s strategy of filing several lawsuits without an initial petition, qualification documents, supporting documents and payment of costs – in other words, empty lawsuits – and filing the necessary documentation only in the lawsuit that fell under a judge preferred by the company, Aneel is requesting that Amazonas Energia be ordered to pay a fine of 10% of the value of the lawsuit, R$45 million.
The Amazonas Energia shares were presented 16 minutes apart. The first was signed at 4:59 p.m. and the last at 5:15 p.m. Here are the full documents:
- full from the action of 16:59 (PDF – 97 kB);
- full from the action of 17:05 (PDF – 168 kB);
- full from the action of 17:10 (PDF – 168 kB);
- full from the 5:15 pm action (PDF – 97 kB).
THE Poder360 contacted Amazonas Energia via email to ask if they would like to comment on Aneel’s accusation. The email was sent at 1:18 pm on Thursday (August 22, 2024). There was no response by the time this report was published. The text will be updated if a comment is sent to this digital newspaper.
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