Corruption CCR-Alckmin: "news laundering" in Folha
"Mario Cesar Carvalho's report in Folha contains all the information about the downfall of executive Renato Alves Vale, who had presided over CCR for 20 years. But the headline in Folha omits the central character of the story: Geraldo Alckmin," says journalist Fernando Brito of Tijolaço.
By Fernando Brito, from brick Mario Cesar Carvalho's report in Folha contains all the information about the downfall of executive Renato Alves Valeque, who had presided over CCR for 20 years.
But the headline in Folha "misses out" on the central character of the story: Geraldo Alckmin, who, according to the testimony of money launderer Adir Assad, was one of the beneficiaries of the operation to exchange fictitious invoices for cash for CCR, a company formed by the construction companies Andrade Gutierrez, Camargo Corrêa, Odebrecht, SVE and Serveng during the "good old days" of Fernando Henrique Cardoso and which has been grabbing concessions left and right ever since.
Using cash, CCR funded Alckmin's campaign through "off-the-books" contributions.
CCR is also negotiating a leniency agreement with the Public Prosecutor's Office of São Paulo in which it intends to disclose that it has done a donation to the slush fund of the campaign of the PSDB candidate Geraldo Alckmin in 2010, the amount was R$ 5 million, as Folha revealed in May.
Alves, the report says, was a friend of Paulo Vieira de Souza, the Tucano operative they tried to forget along the way. But the headline, of course, avoids the well-known "Paulo Preto" and calls him "former director of Dersa".
Geraldo Alckmin, like anyone else – except Lula, for whom it seems this “is irrelevant” – has the right to the presumption of innocence.
For him too, there needs to be proof, not just a simple accusation (which, again, does not apply to Lula).
But Folha's edition is, if you'll pardon the expression, "news whitewashing." That is, the deliberate concealment of the essential information: who received the money, why, and for what purpose.
Moreover, as journalists say in jargon, there's an obvious "hook": yesterday, Alckmin was summoned to testify next month about another case of undeclared campaign contributions, the R$ 10,3 million that his campaigns allegedly received from Odebrecht.
But in Folha, just like in the Odebrecht list, Geraldo Alckmin is a "Saint".