The governor of Amazonas, Wilson Lima (Union), said that he will trigger the STF (Federal Supreme Court) again to try to overturn the elimination of the IPI (Tax on Industrialized Products) on soft drink inputs. The state government had already filed a lawsuit in the Court, last week, against the reduction of the tax on other products.
According to Lima, an ally of President Jair Bolsonaro (PL), the measures would remove tax benefits for companies in the Manaus Free Trade Zone. He stated that he strongly believes “in the president’s good intention of having the courage to face the market and reduce the tax”, something “that the business community expects so much from the government”. However, the president would be “very poorly advised by the economic team”.
For the governor, the Minister of Economy, Paulo Guedes, would be to blame for the decrees. “Paulo Guedes entered 2019 already declaring himself against the Free Zone of Manaus. The objective of this guy is to end the Free Zone of Manaus. This is very clear, no one has doubts” said the Amazonian.
Lima intends to trigger the STF now, as he said in an interview with Estadão/Broadcast, to overturn the soft drink decree and ask for the exclusion of Free Zone products from the IPI reduction measures.
The IPI reduction is part of a “demobilization process”
According to Lima, the elimination of the IPI may result in the closing of Coca-Cola in Brazil and the departure of Ambev from the Free Zone. The Amazonian believes that companies “naturally begin a process of demobilization”.
The government of Amazonas had already entered the STF against the first decree, which had cut 25% of the IPI in February this year. Bolsonaro, at the time, said that the reductions are an “additional benefit for Manaus”.
“This basically doesn’t exist, there wasn’t all that pressure when we reduced the IPI for the rest of Brazil, so it’s an added benefit for Manaus, which is a strategic area,” Bolsonaro said. “The guarantee of the sovereignty of the Amazon goes through the Manaus Free Trade Zone and we will never want that to be threatened.”
*With information from Agência Brasil
