AFP/Sao Paulo

Sao Paulo protesters clashed with police on Friday who used tear gas and sound bombs to disperse crowds, as thousands rallied against Brazil’s latest round of bus fare hikes.
Police resorted to force after part of the march veered from its authorized route, and also arrested one member of the anarchist Black Bloc group, whose radical members took position at the front of the crowd.
Organisers said the protests, called after authorities increased bus fares by 0.50 reais (20 US cents), brought together some 20,000 demonstrators.
Authorities said the number was closer to 3,000.
“It went as usual: the people demonstrated peacefully and the police throw gas,” Isabella, a 22-year-old law student, said, wiping sweat off her face after running from police.
About 1,000 police officers monitored the rally, with part of the demonstration regrouping to carry on after the encounter.
Protesters also called for free student fares.
The rally, called by the Free Pass movement, which also convened protests one week ago in Sao Paulo and Rio, is best known as the force behind 2013 protests that spread nationwide just as the Confederations Cup, a dress rehearsal for the 2014 World Cup, was getting under way.
“The rising price of transport is inconsistent with life conditions in people’s daily lives in Brazil and is more in response to private interests’ wishes,” Joseph Reichmann, a
student, said.
The protest came as Latin America’s largest economy is suffering from a marked economic slowdown, ending 2014 with 6.41% inflation and facing a fifth straight year of low growth.
POWER RATES MAY JUMP 60%: Brazilian electricity rates could rise as much as 60% in 2015 in order to cover the higher cost of power and to pay for subsidies for system expansion, low-income consumers and remote communities, a government source told Reuters on Friday.
Increases of between 50% and 60% are likely in Brazil’s southeastern and central west regions, the source said. The source said the estimate is based on government power-rate simulations for the entire country and on the accounts for the country’s main electricity
subsidy fund the CDE.
The regions are home to the bulk of the Brazil’s population and industry and its most-important farming regions. The source requested anonymity because of a lack of authorisation
to speak to the press.
Increases in the remote Amazon north and underdeveloped Northeast are likely to be about 25%, the source said.
Brazilian power rates have soared since late 2013 as the country’s worst drought in at least 80 years reduced the level of water in hydroelectric reserves and increased the need to run more expensive thermal plants that burn natural gas, diesel fuel, biomass and other fuels.
The price has also been pressured higher by the government’s failure in recent years to auction or license sufficient new electricity generation and transmission rights to meet
distribution utilities needs.
Some utilities’ finances were already fragile after a government move to renew hydroelectric dam concessions early in exchange for rate cuts of 20%
or more.
To cover the soaring costs between the normal annual government rate reviews, the government had to help arrange 17.8bn reais ($6.80bn) of emergency loans in 2014 to prevent utilities from going bankrupt.
The increases are likely to be made up of two parts, the source said. The first will be part of annual government rate adjustment under electricity distributors’
concession contracts.
Brazil’s energy minister said this week that such adjustments will likely be between 20% and 25%.
A second increase will be an “extraordinary” adjustment related to additional costs and the need to raise 23bn reais ($8.78bn) to pay for CDE subsidies.
Brazil’s principal electrical utilities include Centrais Eletricas Brasileiras, or Eletrobras. Companhia Energetica de Minas Gerais Cemig, Eletropaulo Metropolitana SA controlled by US-based utility AES Corp, Cia Paranaense de Energia Eletrica and Cia Energetica do Estado
de Sao Paulo.