This Thursday, the Federal Supreme Court (STF) will analyze the approval of the agreement reached between the union and Axia (formerly Eletrobras) to increase the participation of the federal government in the company’s board of directors.
The agreement was reached after more than a year of reconciliation brokered by the STF. The government will have more seats on the board, and in return, Eletrobras will no longer be obligated to provide resources for the construction of the Angra 3 station, if the federal government decides to go ahead with the project.
The trial began in virtual public session in October, with rapporteur Nunes Marquez voting to approve the agreement. Marquez was accompanied by Dias Toffoli and Edson Fachin, but Minister Alexandre de Moraes asked to be highlighted, interrupting the analysis and moving it to the physical plenary session.
In 2023, the Executive filed a lawsuit against the STF and questioned the prevention of Eletrobras shareholders from exercising their votes in a number exceeding 10% of the number of shares in the voting capital of the company.
Eletrobras’ privatization law prevents shareholders from having voting power of more than 10% even if they have a larger stake. The federal government owns more than 40% of the company’s shares, and thus, Lula’s management has questioned maintaining limited voting power.
The agreement stipulates that the union may nominate three of the ten board members and one of the five representatives to the company’s supervisory board. Previously, the government had the right to have a representative in the collective, which had nine seats. Amid negotiations, the company agreed to increase the number of board seats to ten.
For Nunes Márquez, the terms of the agreement “give prominence to standards of cooperative federalism, while at the same time representing a milestone in matters of corporate governance.” The Minister considers that the provisions are “in line with the urgent demand for a management model that takes into account the peculiarities of a dynamic and competitive market economy.”