The Court of Auditors asked for the suspension of Dias Toffoli’s provision which guaranteed almost 1 billion reals in penduricalhos at 6pm on Friday the 22nd, and at 8pm Barroso rejected the request
BRASILIA – The president of Federal Supreme Court (STF), Luis Roberto Barrosoit took just two hours to reject a request Federal Audit Office (TCU) who urgently requested the reversal of the decision to authorize payments to federal judges of almost 1 billion Brazilian reals.
The person who appealed to the Supreme Court on behalf of the TCU was the Attorney General’s Office (AGU). Sent on Friday 22nd, the request for suspension reached the Court at 6.00 pm. Right on the cover of the document was “urgent” written in red. The AGU argued that one of the duties of the STF president, according to the Court’s Rules of Procedure, is to decide urgent matters during vacation periods. The Supreme Court has been in recess since Wednesday 20. The request was to revoke the decision of Minister Dias Toffoli, who this week signed an order according to which the TCU does not have the power to prevent payments authorized by the National Council of Justice.
At 8pm, Barroso responded to the AGU’s request by stating that the case of the judges’ penduricalhos does not fall within the urgent decisions provided for by the Regulation, and forwarded the request to Minister Dias Toffoli, who is rapporteur of the process. Barroso, that is, did not examine the merits of the issue, but, by rejecting the urgent appeal, kept in force Toffoli’s decision which had ensured the payment of benefits to the federal judges.
«Examining the documents, I see that the case does not fall within the art. 13, VIII, of the Internal Regulations of the Federal Court (RI/STF). The process should be submitted to the illustrious rapporteur”, Barroso decided.
The TCU argued that paying the penduricalhos would carry the risk of “irreparable damage to public coffers”. The Court of Auditors estimated that the inclusion of the additional benefit would represent a monthly impact of R$16 million and an annual impact of R$200 million.
Penduricalho was extinct in 2006, but was resurrected in November last year and caused a conflict between TCU and CNJ
The issue at hand is the retroactive payment of the so-called Additional Service Time (ATS), suspended in April by TCU Minister Jorge Oliveira. Known as a five-year benefit, the benefit allowed an automatic 5% increase every five years on magistrates’ paychecks. The penduricalho had been extinct since 2006, but in November 2022 the Federal Council of Justice (CJF) resurrected it for senior magistrates.
As revealed by Estadao Last Wednesday, the 20th, Toffoli’s decision could mean that magistrates who entered their careers in the 1990s could pocket up to 2 million reals each.
The situation brought to light a conflict between the TCU and the National Council of Justice (CNJ), which approved the payment of the benefit. The national justice inspector, Luís Felipe Salomão, accused the Court of Auditors of meddling in the Council’s affairs.
The federal judges also reacted to the TCU’s decision, they appreciated the Court of Auditors’ decision and the association representing the category, Ajufe, presented a writ of mandate to the STF to restore the benefit. It was then that Toffoli accepted the magistrates’ theory, suspending Jorge Oliveira’s decision last Tuesday, the 19th.
Source: Terra
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