SENT CASH ABROAD’
million and US$2 million respectively to help the re-election of the late Socialist leader.
She said it was Lula, a left-wing icon who ruled from 2003 to 2010 but who is on trial on numerous counts of corruption, who pushed the couple to help regional allies, including El Salvador’s leftist, Mauricio Funes, in 2009.
She said the US$3 million they were given to help in El Salvador — “a country at the end of the world with war, earthquakes and no money” — was provided by Odebrecht, whose former director had himself been jailed for corruption in the Car Wash case.
The couple also worked for former Panamanian president Ricardo Martinelli, who is wanted on corruption charges in his own country and now lives in Miami.
Moura said Martinelli, who was president from 2009 to 2014, gave her half a million dollars in “operating costs” while she was working in Panama on behalf of the man he wanted to succeed him in power.
Santana and Moura were both sentenced last February to eight years for money laundering in connection with the Car Wash scandal, and are now collaborating with prosecutors to reduce their sentences.
In their videotaped testimony, they said both Lula and his successor Rousseff, who was herself impeached for accounting irregularities last year, were fully aware of the illegal campaign financing of their Workers Party.
Lawyers for Lula dismissed the accusations as “lies”. AFP