Why did the Federal Police stop conducting operations?

Brazilian Federal Police arrested Saulo de Tarso Muniz dos Santos, the former head of the Federal Revenue Service in Caruaru, in Maceió on Wednesday. He is accused of involvement in an alleged tax evasion and money laundering scheme.

According to the Federal Police, the investigations, which began two years ago, revealed that Santos had accumulated R$ 12 million in assets, resulting from possible fraud. "The amount was considered incompatible with the salary of the civil servant, who is an auditor for the Federal Revenue Service."

A taxi driver celebrated. “I missed them. Where are the Federal Police vans and their men in black?” the driver asked. Similar laments also come from the mouths of some federal police officers. And mutiny seems widespread. After all, the country got used to seeing the streets crisscrossed by that illuminated disorder that was the sirens of the Federal Police cars going to arrest someone. The sound of the police raids is gone. Everyone wants to know why.

He became accustomed, perhaps even too accustomed, to the persuasive volume of the corporation's operations, which predated the very image of the Lula government. The numbers: the Federal Police's operations increased fifteenfold during Lula's government. They jumped, for example, from 16 in 2003 to 143 by August 2009. From 2003 to 2010, the number of Federal Police employees jumped from 9.231 to 14.575, a growth of 58%. Lula launched 1.244 operations on the streets, mostly under MTB (Ministerial Operations Battalion), which is 25 times more than the 48 carried out by the Federal Police during Fernando Henrique Cardoso's government. In 2010, the Federal Police made 2.734 arrests in 272 special operations. There were 10 fewer operations than in 2009. The drop is explained by the fact that 30% of the corporation's personnel were deployed to provide security for the presidential election.

Three federal police officers, with intense eyes and shrouded brows of astonishment, declared to this reporter: the order within the Federal Police is to suspend operations as much as possible until the World Cup and the Olympics take place. The reason: the Presidency of the Republic, they said, convulsively stamped its feet to ensure the government's image was now completely different. No more confusing explanations about the handcuffing of lawyers, no more devastation of public life with hidden cameras, no more press conferences filled with difficult silences: the country now needs peace to build the two agonizingly global events we are about to host.

Consider these numbers: in the four years of the Growth Acceleration Program (PAC) under Lula's administration, only 19% of the 13.377 planned projects were completed. A batch of 5,1 plans never made it from the drawing board to the real world. The Ministry of Transport heralded an investment of R$ 78,2 billion between 2001 and 2010, but only 61,8% of that was actually spent. Studies conducted with the assistance of the World Bank indicate that, at the National Department of Transport Infrastructure (DNIT), the deadlines are enough to cause heart palpitations: 38 months pass between the decision to build a road, for example, and the start of the removal of the first mountain gravel.

All these figures were released by Gil Castelo Branco, an economist who coordinates the NGO Associação Contas Abertas.

Gil, Brazil's leading authority on monitoring public spending, draws attention to what appears to be a general farce: the proposal in the National Congress for a Differentiated Public Procurement Regime. This measure aims to facilitate projects for the World Cup and the Olympics. It would invert our Law 8.666, the public procurement law: if approved, the Differentiated Public Procurement Regime would allow for the analysis of project proposals first, and only then the qualification documents of the winning company. Under Law 8.666, no action was taken without first analyzing the fiscal and legal background of the company bidding for the public works project.

Hmm... Before the internet, when you couldn't search official gazettes for news about waivers of public bidding processes, reporters would chip in. They'd give a little money to retired journalists to cut out any news item from the public gazettes announcing a waiver of bidding based on recognized expertise. Often, it was a sure thing: companies belonging to friends of government officials were hired around the clock, at the last minute, to perform certain services. Always, of course, based on the concept of recognized expertise. Article 25, item II, of Law No. 8.666/93 establishes that bidding is not required "...for the contracting of technical services listed in Article 13 of this Law, of a unique nature, with professionals or companies of recognized expertise, prohibiting the waiver for advertising and publicity services."

A lot of corruption has been carried out in Brazil based on this. Companies have charged up to 4 percent more for street sweeping because they had "notorious expertise" in collecting litter from the ground. Companies owned by relatives of the government official, of course.

The question the taxi driver asks at the beginning of these lines is enough to make your ears burn: why has the Federal Police stopped conducting operations? Some federal police officers say that Dilma doesn't like the police. Others say there's no more funding. A third group suggests that parts of the government prefer to turn a blind eye to corruption and rampant corruption – simply because without these ingredients, so typical of Brazilian culture, it wouldn't be possible to build a new Brazil for the two global celebrations that await us. Whatever the reason, the World Cup, in its rosy proximity, has put an end to the raids and blitzes by the men in black.