Partners in crime?

Some say yes, some say no. No one knows for sure if General De Gaulle actually said that famous phrase, but if not.

He did it, and could now whisper from his grave: “Brazil is not a serious country.” The proof is right there before our eyes, blatantly obvious. A public bank, capitalized with resources from the National Treasury (“my money, your money, our money”), enters into a R$ 4 billion operation to promote a breach of contract. In practice, it's as if the president of BNDES, Luciano Coutinho, decided to make all Brazilians his accomplices in a corporate crime.

Let's recap. In 1999, the Brazilian Distribution Company, owned by the Diniz family, was looking for a partner to capitalize Pão de Açúcar. It closed a deal with the French group Casino which, in 2012, stipulated the transfer of controlling shares of the company. That's how the game works. Abilio Diniz, a talented businessman, sold his company when he needed resources. Now, in excellent physical and corporate health, he seems to regret it. He knocked on the doors of bankers as audacious as they are fearless, from BTG Pactual, who orchestrated the operation, and from BNDES, which, as always, will provide the money.

It is argued that the bank's capital will serve to maintain 40 jobs at Carrefour – the target of Diniz's covetousness, against the wishes of his partner Casino. But who said Carrefour is leaving Brazil? And even if it did, it would sell its operations to some other group. The fact is that the economist Luciano Coutinho, at BNDES, has been the great master of ceremonies in the formation of oligopolies. His decisions, always packaged with nationalist arguments, serve the financial (and never revealed) interests of private shareholders more than the so-called national interest.

Without any transparency, BNDES has already sponsored the creation of a national "super-telecom" company that ended up being partially sold to a Portuguese group, and also a global mega-meatpacking plant, which concentrated livestock activity in Brazil. There is no evidence that the formation of yet another monopoly, this time in retail, will serve the interests of workers, consumers who shop every week, and industries that currently have few distribution channels for their products.

It's high time to open the Pandora's box of the BNDES (Brazilian Development Bank), which, with money that belongs to everyone, chooses a select few winners without being accountable to anyone. This is definitely not capitalism, nor is it something a serious country should do.