In the uproar over the salary for the civil servant, several opposition deputies announced their irrevocable decision to donate what is due to public good institutions.
Such philanthropic behavior seeks to establish a moral difference with respect not only to the angry members of the Executive Power, but also to the tribunes who do not imitate it, accomplices of the plunder. Assessing its scope, however, requires incorporating additional information into the analysis.
That it be promoted with whistles and noisemakers to the four winds already diminishes a little the ethical stature of generosity. Verifying that it comes from people who spend around 300 thousand pesos a month between diet, scholarships and block expenses brings it closer to the imposition.
The salary is a 35% increase in a single service for the Government’s staff, which links down the ranks of civil servants and benefits even the index points. They are about 50 thousand pesos for ministers and also for legislators, whose allowances are equivalent to the salary of the minister with the highest income: around 180 thousand pesos with the increase.
The 300 thousand of the deputies are rounded with the funds for scholarships that must be processed through the Presidency of the body – and the expenses of the block.
These two concepts were considered part of the income of the legislators in the decree, finally repealed, which set up a management fund of 100 million pesos to distribute among the ministers as a bonus, according to what the Government itself admitted when the partridge jumped.
The main rationale for the decree was that in order to cover management expenses, a fund had to be created in line with the current Regime in the Chamber of Senators of the Province and the Block Expenses Regime in the Chamber of Deputies, which function historically in this area, granting each legislator a monthly amount for said concept, being excluded from the accountability regime.
This is: the Government pointed out in a legal instrument, in which it later backed down due to the scandal, that the block expenses are a concocted pantomime so that legislators have more resources to manage at their discretion.
This assessment, which this newspaper reported, did not produce afflictions among the representatives of the people similar to those now precipitated by the controversial salary, perhaps because it was not convenient to make noise with the fish. It was still going to occur to someone to suggest that they donate the block expenses or, worse, that they launder what they are invested in.
Donating the 50,000 to public good entities is not going to change the lives of parliamentary philanthropists too much.
Why not donate the block expenses as well, since they are so loose? 180 thousand pesos of diet is not mucus and turkey, even considering how oppressive his work regime is.
That said, the self-destructive nature of the way the government handles these issues is evident by now. It is ridiculous to suppose that an increase in salaries to civil servants go unnoticed just because it is not published in the Official Gazette.
The same was intended to be done with the controversial management fund exempt from accountability and the size of the scandal transcended provincial borders.
The salary of the civil servant is a much more sensitive political decision of the State at a time when the salary increase for the public administration is being discussed.
The fairness or unfairness of the remuneration is debatable.
On the other hand, it is not debatable that it be established clandestinely.
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