Senator Kátia Abreu (PP-TO), president of the Senate’s Committee on Foreign Affairs and National Defense, demanded that all nominees for embassies abroad travel to Brasília to participate in the panel meeting, disregarding the new wave of the Covid pandemic. 19 in the world.
The mandatory face-to-face format meant that 21 career workers from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs came to Brazil from different places, including countries and regions that currently promote the closure of economic activities due to the high number of infected people.
The Sabbath period, at the end of November, also took place at a time of great concern due to the identification of the omicron variant, which is considered to be highly transmissible.
Itamaraty reported having spent R$191 thousand to bring the nominees to participate in interviews in Brasília. There were BRL 153.7 thousand in airline tickets and another BRL 37,300 in server daily.
The movement of nominees to Brasília was common practice before the pandemic. With the adoption of restrictive measures and social distancing, however, the procedures changed.
During the last concentrated effort to vote authorities, in December of last year, the commission, then chaired by senator Nelsinho Trad (PSD-MS), decided to poll all nominees through videoconferences. Only the senators were present, as the bylaws of the Legislative House provide that voting for nominations for positions must be done in person.
At that time, Brazil, just like today, was experiencing a period of cooling off from the coronavirus pandemic, with a drop in the number of infected people and deaths due to the disease. The second wave started to impact some Brazilian regions a month later. At the time, in addition to ambassadors, other thematic commissions analyzed nominations for the National Council of Justice, for the National Council of the Public Ministry and for the Superior Labor Court, among other institutions.
Now, in two days, the Committee on Foreign Relations has been appointed by President Jair Bolsonaro to embassies and diplomatic missions. There were two sessions, on the 25th and 30th of November, and only five of the postulants did not have to travel, as they work in Brasília.
In a statement, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs informed that the decision to hold the hearings in person was taken by the Committee on Foreign Affairs and that the virtual format was used, in 2020, “in exceptional character, given the restrictions to mobility resulting from the Covid pandemic. 19”.
A large part of the diplomats who had to come to Brazil currently work in Europe, a continent that has been suffering from the pandemic. They came from places like Belgium, Germany, Switzerland and Spain.
Three weeks ago, the WHO (World Health Organization) warned that around 500,000 people could die from Covid by March if the contagion curve is not reversed. Countries like Belgium, where two Saturdays came from, imposed restrictive measures, as there is a record of a higher number of contagions than the peak of the pandemic last year. In Vienna, Austria, where Ambassador José Antônio Marcondes de Carvalho works, the authorities decreed a lockdown to try to contain the rise in infections.
In addition to the health risks, the arrival of ambassadors in the midst of the pandemic could result in damage to the work of diplomatic posts, as many countries are imposing security measures for travelers arriving in their territories. China, where ambassador Paulo Estivallet de Mesquita came from, imposes a minimum quarantine of two weeks for travelers coming from abroad.
Senator Kátia Abreu’s office said in a note that the virtual format was used, exceptionally, in 2020, given the restrictions to mobility resulting from the pandemic. “Returning to the traditional format in 2021 was a prerogative exercised by the Federal Senate, since the connections to the areas were reestablished, and sanitary restrictions were suspended, through the adoption of protocols such as using a mask and presenting negative test results to Covid-19 “, states the text.
“In compliance with constitutional determinations, the CRE held, in compliance with all established sanitary protocols, a record number of 30 sittings, 21 of which in a joint effort system, in order to reduce the backlog for certain posts”, completes the text.
The hearings may have been one of the last acts of the parliamentarian as president of CRE. Kátia Abreu articulates to be the name indicated by the Senate for the vacancy in the Court of Auditors of the Union opened with the appointment of minister Raimundo Carreiro to become ambassador of Brazil in Lisbon.
.
