Bolsonaro ex-minister arrested for graft
BRASILIA: A Brazilian former education minister accused of influence peddling, allegedly at the request of President Jair Bolsonaro, was arrested on Wednesday, police and a defence lawyer said.
Milton Ribeiro resigned in March over allegations that he channelled public funds to allies of two influential Evangelical pastors at Mr Bolsonaro’s “special request”.
Newspaper Folha de Sao Paulo revealed an audio recording of Mr Ribeiro saying he gave priority in deciding school-funding requests to municipalities governed by “friends” of the pastors.
One mayor reportedly said he had been asked for a kilogramme of gold in exchange for having his school-funding request cleared.
The claims triggered calls from opposition lawmakers for Mr Ribeiro and Mr Bolsonaro to be investigated.
Mr Bolsonaro, a conservative Catholic, won the presidency in 2018 with solid backing from Brazil’s powerful Evangelical Christian movement.
He is keen to keep the Evangelical vote as he seeks re-election in October, trailing in the polls to leftist ex-president Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva.
Mr Bolsonaro and Mr Ribeiro, himself a Presbyterian pastor, have denied wrongdoing.
“Based on documents, testimony and the final report of the preliminary investigation... possible indications of criminal practice in the granting of public budgets were identified,” Brazilian police said in a statement.
Mr Ribeiro’s arrest, it said, was the result of an operation across four Brazilian states on Wednesday morning to dismantle a criminal network, with officers armed with five arrest warrants and 13 search warrants.
He risks a sentence of between two and five years for influence peddling and two to 12 years for corruption, the police said.
Mr Ribeiro’s lawyer Daniel Bialski in a statement described his client’s arrest as “unjust” and “indisputably unnecessary.”
The Ministry of Education confirmed its premises were searched on Wednesday and said it intended to cooperate with investigators.
In March, Mr Bolsonaro defended Mr Ribeiro and called the claims “cowardly.”
On Wednesday, the president appeared to distance himself from his former minister. “Let him answer for his actions, I pray to God that he has no problem. But if he does, it shows that I have no influence on the police,” he told the Itaitiaia radio station.
Mr Ribeiro, 64, took office in July 2020 — the third education minister in the cabinet of Bolsonaro.