OAS defrauded contracts in seven countries to pay bribes, says whistleblower.
The manager of OAS's international clandestine accounting area, former executive Alexandre Portela Barbosa, stated that the construction company used fictitious contracts in seven different countries to generate illegal money used for bribery payments and slush funds in Brazil and abroad; the fraudulent contracts signed between 2010 and 2014 totaled approximately R$ 447 million; these funds were channeled into the accounts of money launderers, who carried out financial transactions abroad and remitted the money to Brazil.
247 - The manager of OAS's international clandestine accounting area, former executive Alexandre Portela Barbosa, stated that the construction company used fictitious contracts in seven different countries to generate illegal money used for bribery payments and slush funds in Brazil and abroad. In a plea bargain approved by the Supreme Federal Court, he said that OAS units based in Chile, Costa Rica, Ecuador, Guatemala, Peru, Trinidad and Tobago, and the British Virgin Islands were used for this illicit purpose. The fraudulent contracts signed by these branches of the construction company between 2010 and 2014 totaled approximately US$120 million, or R$447 million. The funds supplied accounts of money launderers, who made the financial transactions abroad and sent the money to Brazil.
According to O Globo newspaperEight former executives from OAS's clandestine accounting sector, known as the "Structured Projects Control Department," reported bribe payments and undeclared campaign contributions totaling R$ 125 million to at least 21 politicians from eight different parties.
One of the reported frauds occurred in 2012 and concerned the construction of a hydroelectric plant in Ecuador, carried out by OAS's branch in that country.
Barbosa said he visited the construction site accompanied by another executive from the construction company because it presented a "significant profit margin" that would facilitate the misappropriation of funds. "Due to the fact that the construction company OAS was performing an important contract in Ecuador, in the city of Babahoya ('Proyecto Multiproposito UHE Baba'), both went to the construction camp in the interior of Ecuador to seek information that had been produced by the company to verify if they could use it to draw up one or more fictitious contracts," says the former executive.
After analysis and intermediation by money launderers, OAS Ecuador hired a shell company based in Spain. "With this scheme, they generated an off-the-books fund with a gross value of US$ 9,2 million, through a 100% fictitious contract for consulting and engineering services that were never provided," reported Alexandre Barbosa.