By RAUL PONT*

The Brazilian electoral system is a true fraud, which was incorporated into the Federal Constitution of 1988, survives and is maintained by the majority of the Chamber

1.

The Brazilian Parliament is generous in establishing benefits and privileges for its members. Salaries, allowances, number of advisors, greater access to the Electoral Fund and the infamous mandatory amendments to the Budget have made Congress the world record holder in costs to the public treasury. The most scandalous is the private pension fund paid for by the Public Budget, when parliamentarians should be the first to set an example and comply with the law that determines that elected officials, from city councilor to President of the Republic, contribute to the Public Pension Fund (INSS) during their terms, like any other citizen.

In 1991, at the beginning of that legislature, all 36 PT deputies officially notified the President of the House, Deputy Ibsen Pinheiro, of their refusal to contribute to the then Congressional Pension Institute (IPC), as its existence violated the law and established a privilege. The Board of Directors rejected the request, claiming that the Congressional Pension Institute was a public institution and that the contribution, as for the INSS, was compulsory, obligatory.

With the pension reform of the FHC government, the Institute changed its name, increased the contribution, the number of terms, and the age to receive the benefit, but the privilege and support of the public budget were consolidated and the law was forgotten. The esprit de corps, accommodation and the process of bureaucratization in Congress and in the parties prevailed.

Privileges also occur in the Judiciary, which are increasingly indefensible and which create a chasm between its members and other legal careers and the population, with the Brazilian people who, according to the IBGE Census data, in their vast majority, have to live on one or two minimum wages.

There is no parallel in industrialized capitalist societies with the social inequality that prevails in Brazil. And when this also occurs in public functions, it is clear that the legitimacy and trust in these institutions becomes easy prey to the discredit of their original functions.

2.

But let's get back to the casuistry of Congress. With the inauguration of Deputy Hugo Motta as Speaker of the Chamber, a problem that the House postpones with each Census has resurfaced. The law determines that with each Census (in principle every 10 years), in light of the new demographic reality of the States, the Superior Electoral Court (TSE) should calculate the adequacy of the new numbers with the proportional representation of deputies in the Federal Chamber. It's that simple and objective.

It turns out that for more than two Censuses the Federal Chamber has not complied with the law. In an article published in GZH Portal, on 26/2/25, Congressman Hugo Motta, in order not to upset his peers, came up with a brilliant solution. Instead of complying with the law, he suggested increasing the number of congressmen from the current 513 to 527, thus satisfying the needs of the states that complained that they were underrepresented. The new president did not deny his origins: a compromise and everyone would be satisfied. Of course, the House Budget would have a “modest” increase of R$46 million per year, in addition to some renovations to the buildings and offices for the new congressmen.

The same logic of advantages, salaries and privileges resolved by casuistry, by conciliations. The matter of GZHMore says that the calculation of this new cost was made by economists linked to the Millenium Institute, who also mention one of the distortions that should be corrected. Currently, Amazonas and Paraíba, with the same population, have, respectively, 8 and 12 deputies in the Federal Chamber.

Of course, Hugo Motta's casuistry must be criticized. The Chamber must adapt its composition according to the new Census and not create more expenses in a Parliament that already holds the record for public spending. But the problem here is only apparent and it is incredible that the newspaper that boasts of its investigative character has remained superficial.

The problem with the Federal Chamber is not only that it does not respect the demographic changes of recent decades, but in the case of proportionality of citizenship representation, it is that it has not yet reached the elementary principle of the liberal revolutions of the 18th and 19th centuries – one citizen, one vote.

These are not just adjustments for Amazonas and Paraíba. The electoral system in the 1988 Constitution maintained almost everything from the dictatorial system. One of the most antidemocratic elements that came from the dictatorship was the practice of transforming former territories into states and guaranteeing them, regardless of population, a minimum of eight representatives, which also applies to small states or new states created more recently.

If there is something that needs to be changed in the electoral system, immediately, it is this brutal anti-democratic distortion that continues to this day and distorts the results. In other words, a true electoral fraud (not the electronic voting fraud as the coup plotters of January 8th wanted), which was incorporated into the Federal Constitution of 1988 and survives and is maintained by the majority of the Chamber. The Federal Constitution of 1988 maintained that no state may have fewer than eight deputies and no more than 60 deputies. A constitutional amendment in the 1990s changed the limit to 70, but the distortion, the fraud, remains blatant.

Let's look at the numbers. Some states, due to their population, would have one or two representatives, but they elect eight! If we add up the 10 smallest states (RO, AP, AC, TO, RO, SE, MS, AL, PI and RN), according to the IBGE Census, in 2024, we have the sum of 21 million Brazilians who elect 80 federal representatives. The state of São Paulo, with almost 46 million inhabitants, therefore more than double the number of inhabitants, elects only 70 federal representatives. This is more than a distortion, it is a fraud in the principle of equality of the citizen vote that is also in the Constitution.

If the Brazilian Congress wants to regain legitimacy, consideration and respect in front of the Brazilian people, it must correct this and other issues, such as parliamentary amendments and nominal voting that have made the country ungovernable.

*Raul Pont He is a professor and former mayor of Porto Alegre.

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