Itaipú Opens its Doors to Paraguayan and Brazilian Auditors

RIO DE JANEIRO, BRAZIL – The Paraguayan director of Itaipú, Ernst Bergen, and his Brazilian counterpart, Joaquim Silva e Luna, requested for the first time the preparation of a diplomatic note so that the Comptroller General of Paraguay and the Brazilian Court of Auditors may look into Itaipú Binational’s books.

Bergen submitted this request on Monday morning to the Minister of Foreign Affairs, Antonio Rivas, in a meeting where the option of resuming negotiations over the establishment of the Binational Accounts Commission was discussed.

“To advance the process of refinement and transparency in management, the Executive Board of Itaipú considers it important also to have an external control mechanism,” states the request. The document adds that this “would assist the two countries in the accounting, financial, budgetary, operational and asset control of the company concerning the legality, legitimacy, and economy of its actions.”

In this respect, Paraguay’s foreign minister, Antonio Rivas, mentioned that the Brazilian director of the hydroelectric plant is also carrying out the same process in the neighboring country.

The Ministries of Foreign Affairs of Paraguay and Brazil will now prepare a draft Diplomatic Note, which once signed by the senior officials, will be forwarded to the respective Congresses for evaluation and subsequent approval.

The Binational’s Paraguayan director stated that he had held a bilateral meeting on August 8th with his Brazilian counterpart, in which they considered it convenient “to open up everything so that the control bodies could check the relevant information.”

Itaipú has been the target of a political crisis involving several government officials, which was triggered after the secret signing of the bilateral agreement between Paraguay and Brazil for the purchase and sale of energy from the binational company, which was detrimental to Paraguay.

The controversy that it sparked and the criticism that it triggered in different political and civil sectors compelled the opening of investigations by the Prosecutor’s Office and the Bicameral Investigation Commission of Congress, which have already summoned those involved in the Itaipú agreement to testify.