A Brazilian parliamentary inquiry committee has approved the lifting of bank and tax secrecy of the son of the Brazilian president due to an alleged link with a businessman accused of defrauding the social security system.
After the announcement of the results of a series of requests to lift bank and tax secrecy, chaos broke out in the room, with lawmakers from the government bloc questioning the vote count and the voting procedure.
According to local media, Fábio Luís Lula da Silva, a biologist and businessman known as Lulinha, became the target of questioning by opposition lawmakers after the Polícia Federal seized messages exchanged between businessman Antônio Carlos Camilo Antunes and a businesswoman, in which there were alleged references to his name.
The businesswoman in question, Roberta Luchsinger, described as a friend of the Brazilian head of state’s son, is said to have received payments from Camilo Antunes to broker contacts with entities in the health sector, in the context of the commercialization of medicinal cannabis products.
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Roberta Luchsinger was the target of a Federal Police operation and denies any wrongdoing in her relationship with the businessman.
According to the rapporteur of the case, Congressman Alfredo Gaspar, the lifting of secrecy is justified by the suspicion that the president’s son may have acted as a “silent partner” of Antônio Carlos Camilo Antunes.
“The need to investigate Fábio Luís arises directly from intercepted messages in which Antônio Camilo, when questioned about the recipient of a payment of 300,000 reais [around 49,500 euros] intended for Roberta Luchsinger’s company, explicitly replies that it was ‘the boy’s son’,” he said during the parliamentary inquiry committee session.
