A senator ally of Jair Bolsonaro, arrested with money hidden in his underwear

Bolsonaro during an event in Brasilia, last Wednesday.Eraldo Peres / AP

The approximately 30,000 reais (about $ 5,300) that the Federal Police discovered on Wednesday in the underpants of Senator Chico Rodrigues, until then vice-leader of the Brazilian Government, during an operation that investigates the misappropriation of public funds destined to the fight against the coronavirus in the State of Roraima, they contradict the most recent narrative of the Executive.

On the same day as the police raid against one of his allies, President Jair Bolsonaro said that he would give "a flying kick to the neck" of those who were involved in illegal acts during his administration, reinforcing the previous week's speech, in which He acknowledged that he had closed Operation

because "there is no longer corruption in the Government."

Despite the scandal that compromised a key figure of Bolsonarism in Congress, the government trench continues to sustain the discourse of its honesty.

The president himself was quick to distance himself from Chico Rodrigues.

"If a councilor does something wrong, I have nothing to do with it," said Bolsonaro, rejecting any relationship with the episode and qualifying operation Desvid-19 - which investigates a possible overbilling of 20 million reais (3.5 million dollars). ) in contracts made by the Roraima Health Secretariat - as “a pride” for his Government. Although he wanted to distance himself from the case, Bolsonaro maintained a close relationship with Rodrigues, who employs Leo Índio, his children's cousin and his Councilor Carlos Bolsonaro's henchman, the president even declared that he was a “de facto partner” of the parliamentarian, who was his colleague in the Chamber of Deputies for two decades.

On Thursday, the government announced the dismissal of the senator under investigation, emphasizing that the Federal Police operation was "proof that the government continues to fight corruption in all sectors of Brazilian society, without distinction or privilege."

The vice president, Hamilton Mourão, also wanted to highlight his distancing from Rodrigues by declaring that he is no longer part of the Government.

"All those who are in Parliament and work on behalf of the Government are auxiliaries, they are not members of the Executive."

The Federal Supreme Court suspended Chico Rodrigues for 90 days, but the Senate has yet to ratify or not this decision.

The Court, however, denied the arrest request submitted by the Federal Police and decreed the investigation secret.

Nor did it authorize the publication of the video that the Federal Police recorded when the agents searched the senator and removed the bundles of money from his underwear.

"If it is proven that he is guilty, he will be punished, but it is not necessary for him to be publicly humiliated," Barroso explained in his decision.

Setbacks in the fight against corruption

Although Bolsonaro treats the scandal of his former ally as something outside the government, it is further evidence of the weakening of the mechanisms to fight corruption.

Together with the denunciations of wanting to interfere with the Federal Police, it further calls into question the story of integrity that the Bolsonarista sectors boast about.

This week, the NGO Transparency International has published two reports that attest "a progressive deterioration of the institutional anti-corruption framework in the country, for which the President of the Republic and other authorities are directly responsible."

According to studies by the NGO, which denounced the Brazilian government before the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD), since last year Brazil has not fulfilled the commitments it assumed in the international conventions against corruption, organized crime and financing of terrorism.

Among the setbacks indicated by the report are the appointment of a public prosecutor (Augusto Aras) out of the triple list presented by the Public Ministry, deficiencies in the transparency mechanisms, the partial disclosure of data - including the number of contagions and deaths from covid-19— and replacements at the top of the Federal Police and the Treasury.

One of the documents indicates that what has most alarmed international organizations has been the preliminary decision to suspend "some thousand investigations and money laundering processes" for almost a semester.

Transparency International had already published in January another study that indicated that the perception of the existence of corruption in Brazil had increased.

The situation worsened in May, when former judge Sergio Moro left his post as Minister of Justice, accusing Bolsonaro of intervening in the Federal Police after having exonerated, without the approval of the minister, the general director of the body, Maurício Valeixo.

With Moro's resignation, the dismantling of the anti-corruption operation Lava Jato was accelerated.

The Institute I Do Not Accept Corruption (INAC), favorable to the

operation

, has also signaled setbacks in the anti-corruption crusade.

At an event on the subject last month, prosecutor Roberto Livianu highlighted that the president had chosen Aras as the attorney general of the Republic to protect his family, especially his son Flávio Bolsonaro, from investigations into alleged misappropriations of money.

According to a Federal Police report, since the beginning of the year more than 50 operations have been carried out similar to the one that discovered money in Senator Chico Rodrigues' underpants.

In total, 5.5 billion reais ($ 975 million) were seized, more than double what was seized in 2018 and 2019 combined.

Most of the operations were carried out by the special group to fight corruption during the pandemic, created by Moro in April, before leaving the Ministry of Justice and Public Security.

Although catching a deputy with money in his private parts is not unprecedented, the fact that he is someone so close to the current government blurs the image of an anti-corruption paladin that Bolsonaro tries to sell.

“That 30,000 reais have been found between the buttocks of the vice-leader of the Government shows the degree of credibility of the President of the Republic (head of the Government) when he affirms that there is no longer corruption in his Government and that for this reason he was ending Operation Lava Jato ”, criticizes the prosecutor Livianu.

In a live broadcast Thursday night, Bolsonaro reiterated that he has nothing to do with the senator's scandal.

Accompanied by the ministers André Mendonça, of Justice, and Wagner Rosario, of the Comptroller General, he maintained that the integrity of his management can only be measured by the names he chooses.

“In my government there is no corruption.

Zero.

My Government are the ministers, ”he said.