The adoption of a criterion to determine the number of national seats held by each country will be the main theme of the next session of the Mercosul Parliament, in November. This is what the president of the parliament, Brazilian deputy Dr. Rosinha (PT-PR), said during a meeting of the Brazilian representation with ambassador Regis Arslanian, Brazilian permanent representative to Mercosul and the Latin American Integration Association (Aladi).

Up to this moment, each national representation is formed by 18 representatives, regardless of the total population of each country. The future structure should be decided until the end of the year, in order to have time to prepare the elections that will appoint the new members of the Parliament – in Brazil, an election will be held in 2010. Each country will have at least 18 seats, but there is no definition of what will be the maximum number of seats held by each country.

- If we do not discuss this issue right now, we will not be able to set a rule. Argentineans have already decided they will join this debate – said Rosinha.

The debate will only start in November because, due to the municipal elections in Brazil, there will be no session of the Mercosul Parliament in October. There are two scheduled sessions for November. Initially, the Parliament was considering the possibility of organizing a session in December in Bahia, along with the summit meeting of Mercosul’s presidents, to be held in Costa do Sauípe. But the idea was dropped and the session will be held, as usually, in Montevideo, on December 18-19. During this meeting, a new board will be elected.

During the meeting with Arslanian, senator Geraldo Mesquita Júnior (PMDB-AC) suggested that the Brazilian representation in Mercosul Parliament should be equally distributed among all states. In case the representation is formed by 54 representatives, each member of the federation – 26 states and the Federal District – would elect two members.

- The idea is to spread this debate all over Brazil. As long as each state has to elect its own representatives, we will have these discussions reaching the entire country – proposed Mesquita.

The idea was supported by senator Sérgio Zambiasi (PTB-RS), who understands that the debate over Mercosul should not be restricted to states located on the border with other countries of the bloc. Zambiasi also recommended caution in the definition of the number of seats to be held by each country. In his opinion, the bloc’s biggest nations – Brazil and Argentina – should not opt for rules that would diminish the participation of the other remaining countries.

The notion that Brazil and Argentina often gather forces to undermine less powerful member states is becoming more common in the press from the other countries of the bloc. As observed by Arslanian, Uruguayan press has complained of the decision made by Argentina and Brazil to use local currencies in bilateral trades – a decision that could reduce as much as 8% of the total costs paid by companies, as informed by the ambassador.

However, as reminded by Arslanian, the decision was taken during a Mercosul meeting, where Uruguay and Paraguay decided not to follow Brazil and Argentina for that moment.  

- They are saying once again that Mercosul is becoming bilateral, that the bloc does not exist. But the decision was approved by the whole bloc – reminded Arslanian.

So far, informed the ambassador, only US$ 8 million of the Structural Convergence Fund were invested by Paraguay in projects aiming to reduce the bloc’s “asymmetries”. US$ 158 million are currently available, and the amount will rise to US$ 210 million by the end of the year, according to Arslanian.