Brasília, February 5, 2004 (Agência Brasil - ABr) - The head of the President's administrative staff, Minister Luiz Dulci, disclosed today that the government may release additinal funds to aid rain victims in 15 states, especially in the Northeast. Opposition legislators criticized the government on Tuesday (3) for the delay in releasing funds and, most of all, the amount, R$ 32 million, considered insufficient to cover the damages suffered so far.
Dulci rebutted the criticisms, recalled that the government is not standing still but decided to act on various fronts to alleviate the effects of the flooding. "It is not just a matter of sending funds. The presence of the Armed Forces, for example, with its structure in various regions of the country, has costs, and the government covers these expenses. The resources that the government is investing directly and indirectly are far superior to this value, but, if necessary, the government will see to it that more money is made available," he said.
The Minister was one of the federal executive officials present at the launching of the CUT TV program in the Grand Hall of the National Congress. Also in attendance were the Ministers of the Secretariat of Economic and Social Development, Jaques Wagner, Labor, Ricardo Berzoini, Justice, Márcio Thomaz Bastos, and Planning, Guido Mantega.
The Central Workers' Union's (CUT) program will be transmitted for the first time on Saturday (7), at 2:15 P.M., on Network TV's open channel. It represents a partnership between the central union and the TV network, at a monthly cost of R$ 300 thousand. The theme of the first program will be unemployment in the country.
Both Berzoini and Wagner minimized the impression that the CUT's choice of a thorny issue for the government as the theme of its first program would constitute an embarrassment for the government. CUT president, Luiz Marinho, holds the same view. "There is no problem, this is a democracy. One of the ways in which the CUT can help the government is to show where there are problems," he summed up. (DAS)
