"Azeredo puts the PSDB at the center of the crisis"

Mines 247 Professor Vitor Marchetti, from the Federal University of ABC, believes that, "before Azeredo's arrest, the PSDB already had enough problems to position itself as a party of ethical renewal, to try to distance itself from the investigations and protect itself as a party that is shielded from these cases."

“This decision against Azeredo definitively places the PSDB at the center of the political-party crisis. Of course, the level of impact on the PT is enormous due to the size of the leadership involved. But I would say it's not so much smaller for the PSDB, considering some impacts, such as what happened with Aécio in the JBS plea bargain; the different mentions of PSDB politicians in spreadsheets with information on bribe payments by companies; Alckmin himself, presented as a 'Saint' in Odebrecht spreadsheets; and the subway scandals in São Paulo,” says the scholar to Lilian Venturini, on the Nexo website.

Asked how PSDB's opponents should deal with Azeredo's arrest, the professor states that "the PT, fundamentally, should highlight that central idea with which the party already works, which is the selectivity of the Justice system. Azeredo is the first actor who taints the PSDB within the logic of the mensalão scandal, which happened some years ago."

"More than exploiting the fact that the PSDB has corruption scandals, the strategy will be to show how slow and selective the justice system is, depending on the party affiliation of the person under investigation. Even others involved in the PSDB's mensalão scandal were not punished because the statute of limitations had expired [as in the cases against former vice-governor Walfrido dos Mares Guia, former director Lauro Wilson, and Cláudio Mouro, coordinator of Azeredo's 1998 campaign]."