The salary kickback scheme involving then Rio de Janeiro state lawmaker and son of the president, Flávio Bolsonaro, is apparently something he inherited from his father, according to three reports published by the Uol news website last Monday, July 5th. Evidence shows that as a federal congressman, President Jair Bolsonaro set up an illegal payroll scheme within his cabinet.
According to Andrea Siqueira Valle, the retired army captain's former sister-in-law, Bolsonaro even fired her brother André Siqueira Valle from the cabinet, after he reufsed to hand over nearly 90% of his salary as an advisor to Bolsonaro in 2007.
Both Andrea and André were among the 18 relatives of Ana Cristina Siqueira Valle, the president's second wife, who were appointed to Bolsonaro's cabinet while he was still a federal congressman between 1991 and 2018.
At the outset of the marriage between Ana Cristina and Jair Bolsonaro, the president’s then wife began recruiting family members. She would have once said, that all she needed was the tax ID number of those who accepted to work in the federal congressman’s office. She would also have stated that it would not be necessary to work every day, but only to hand out leaflets during election campaigns. The agreement, however, was to kickback 90% of their monthly salary.
Phantom employee
The former sister-in-law even confirmed that she had been a phantom employee of Flávio Bolsonaro. According to an inquiry by the Public Ministry of Rio de Janeiro, she received R$ 674.9 thousand, between 2008 and 2018 as an employee of the then state congressman Flávio Bolsonaro, while he worked in the Rio de Janeiro Legislative Assembly. She withdrew 98% of the total, that is, R$663.6 thousand.
In a separate report, Uol revealed in an audio recording of Márcia Aguiar and Nathália Queiroz, respectively the wife and daughter of Fabrício Queiroz, a close ally of the Bolsonaro clan, that the president would not let Queiroz return to politics so soon, after a report in the O Globo newspaper revealed that Queiroz was engaged in political articulations even after the kickback scheme in Flávio Bolsonaro’s cabinet was uncovered.
In addition to Queiroz, Uol also showed that retired army colonel Guilherme dos Santos Hudson, Bolsonaro's colleague from his time at the Agulhas Negras military academy, worked in collecting the salaries from advisors in Flávio's former cabinet. The information was also brought forth by Jair Bolsonaro's ex sister-in-law, Andrea Siqueira Valle, who is Hudson's niece.
"Uncle Hudson also exposed himself, because he was the one who collected the money. He was the one who took me to and picked me up from the bank," Andrea said in an audio recording released in the Uol report.
According to the Rio de Janeiro public ministry, which is also investigating Hudson, there were 16 withdrawals that totaled R$ 260,000 from the colonel's bank and tax account, as stated in the O Globo report. One of the withdrawals was of R$43,000 in cash.
Edited by: Vivian Virissimo
