Money returned by Alerj was for Education and Security and not for Health

In a statement this afternoon, the president of the Rio de Janeiro State Legislative Assembly (Alerj), André Ceciliano, presented documents that dismantle the testimony of former secretary Edmar Santos. These documents demonstrate the inconsistency between the content of his testimony and the facts, corroborated by internal Assembly documents.

Contrary to what the whistleblower stated, the R$ 106 million returned to the State Treasury in mid-2019 was not destined for the Health Department, but rather to settle the debt related to the salaries of employees seconded from the Education Department (R$ 50 million) and the Departments of Penitentiary Administration, Fire Department, Civil Police, Military Police, and Degase (R$ 56 million).

Therefore, there is no connection between the returned amount and health-related projects, as the informant claimed. This contradicts Edmar Santos's revelation, which, on page 304 of the Federal Public Prosecutor's Office's indictment, states that "the strategy presented by the president of Alerj in mid-2019 consisted of diverting, for the benefit of the deputies, surplus funds from the Legislative Branch's monthly budget allocations donated to the state treasury under the pretext of financing municipal health departments." The two official documents alongside show, on the contrary, that the returns are not related to Health.

With documents in hand, Ceciliano showed that there is no link between the amounts returned at the time and the transfers to municipal health funds, a thesis apparently embraced by the Federal Public Prosecutor's Office without other data that could corroborate it: “I have the official document here paying R$ 50 million, with the purpose of covering expenses for employees assigned to Alerj, prioritizing those from the Education Secretariat. There is a transfer of 50 million and another of R$ 56.253.508,70, to settle the liabilities of the Penitentiary Administration Secretariat, Fire Department, Civil Police, Military Police and Degase.”

In 2020, during the pandemic, the Rio de Janeiro State Legislative Assembly (Alerj) effectively transferred R$ 100 million to the State Government so that the Health Secretariat could then distribute the funds to the municipal health funds of the state's 92 municipalities. However, the complaint is, in its most substantial part, based on 2019, when the repayments were justified by the need to settle the outstanding salaries of employees seconded from the Education and Security sectors.

The president of Alerj cited official letters from the State Secretary of Education, Pedro Fernandes, demanding payment of the amounts accumulated in the years 2015, 2016, 2017 and 2018 for the assignment of employees to Alerj.

OUR OPINION

The statement by the president of the Rio de Janeiro State Legislative Assembly weakens the prosecution's case, which appears to have been built solely on the informant's version of events, without any attempt to present evidence.

Confessions are important but should be taken with caution, as an informant who is arrested often tries to exaggerate commonplace events, transforming them into crimes, in an attempt to mitigate their sentence. An informant's word only serves as a starting point for an investigation. Beyond that, we enter the slippery terrain of irresponsible accusations, which are later, belatedly, clarified. Palocci can attest to that.