Last week, news came out that worried some of the beneficiaries of Auxílio Brasil. The Public Prosecutor's Office of the Federal Court of Auditors (TCU) filed a request for immediate suspension of the release of the program's loan.

The bank began contracting loans on October 11th and in just 4 days, more than R$ 1.8 billion were lent to more than 700,000 Auxílio Brasil families.

The document, signed by deputy attorney Lucas Furtado, indicates signs of a misuse of purpose in making the loan and a purely electoral objective when granting payroll loans to low-income families. The request sent by the MP highlights the risk of loss to the treasury and Caixa.

“I come to the TCU to express my deepest concern and denounce the actions carried out by Caixa Econômica Federal, possibly in misuse of purpose, which have become public and notorious, and in the end request from this Court of Auditors the appropriate measures to avoid damage to the coffers of that public bank, as well as to reestablish the morality of public administration”, said the deputy prosecutor.

The order also assesses the impact that the release of payroll loans could have on the second round of elections, as Jair Bolsonaro's campaign made it clear that it seeks the vote of this most vulnerable segment of the population, including female heads of families to whom the president promised the payment of a 13th of the Auxílio Brasil.

“Everything indicates that this is a measure aimed mainly at serving political electoral interests that put the public interest in the background in order to obtain personal gains to the detriment of the population”, says the document.

The Federal Audit Court (TCU) issued an opinion recommending the suspension of the Auxílio Brasil loan. According to the court, the reason for the recommendation is the possible use of the loan for political interference in the presidential elections. 

Now, Caixa Econômica Federal has five working days from Thursday (20) to explain the reason for releasing the consignment between the period separating the first and second round of elections.

So far, the bank has not yet announced whether it will immediately suspend payroll loans. The opinion's recommendation is that, given the imminent damage, not only to Caixa Econômica Federal, but also to the current electoral process, “as a precautionary measure, Caixa will refrain from granting new loans, regardless of any legal or infra-legal regulation to beneficiaries of Auxílio Brasil until the final decision of this Court of Auditors“.

The Auxílio Brasil loan was released 10 days ago, but so far only a few families have actually received the money in their account. In recent days, complaints from beneficiaries have increased regarding the status of the contract “in processing”.

Initially, Caixa informed that the deadline for analyzing the loan request is 48 hours (2 working days). However, the bank stated that it is receiving many requests, which has caused slowness in the process of analyzing loan requests.

In some cases, the Consumer Protection Institute (IDEC) received reports from beneficiaries who were not notified of the release of payroll loans only for the month of December. In the first week of the loan, Idec received more than 2,000 complaints regarding the Auxílio Brasil payroll loan. 

To monitor whether the Auxílio Brasil loan has been approved, the user must access the Caixa Tem application and monitor the progress of the request through the Loans conversation.

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