PL files suit with the STF against temporary tax on crude oil exports

The Liberal Party (PL) filed, this Wednesday (8), a Direct Action of Unconstitutionality with a request for a precautionary measure against the tax on crude oil exports that the government intends to establish for four months.

The opposition wants the Federal Supreme Court (STF) to suspend the validity of the tax at least until the final judgment on the merits of the action.

The temporary tax is included in an article in the Provisional Measure edited by the President of the Republic, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva (PT), at the end of February. Therefore, it has the force of law, although it needs to be approved by the National Congress in order not to lose its validity.

The government’s intention is to institute a tax rate of 9.2% on the export of crude oil or bituminous minerals until June 30 of this year.

The opposition in the Senate, which includes the PL, however, claims that the essence of the export tax is being distorted “in order, using its extrafiscal nature and its immediate applicability, to achieve an express collection purpose and, also, with linked allocation of resources”.

“With the aim of evading, albeit unconstitutionally, the principles of precedence (an ironclad clause), predictability and legal certainty, the President of the Republic imposes, with immediate applicability, a tax of an extrafiscal, regulatory nature, with express and exclusive tax collection purpose, in order to create a source of funding and offset the partial exemption of fuels, revealing the flagrant material unconstitutionality of the legal maneuver adopted”, says an excerpt from the document filed with the Supreme Court.

“In effect, by distorting the essence of the Export Tax, establishing a tax collection purpose, one actually has the stipulation of a Contribution for Intervention in the Economic Domain – CIDE disguised as an Export Tax, a legal juggle made precisely because it is known that the Cide cannot be instituted on export revenues in accordance with the Federal Constitution”, states in another section.

In a press conference in the Senate, the leader of the PL in the House, Carlos Portinho (RJ), also said that states where oil is extracted will have losses in the distribution of royalties.

The leader of the opposition in the House, Rogério Marinho (PL-RN), said that, with the measure, the government gives “a signal of breach of contracts and legal uncertainty”.

Source: CNN Brasil

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