Five years after Brazilian prosecutors exposed a long-running bribes-for-contrac...
SAO PAULO/RIO DE JANEIRO - Five years after Brazilian prosecutors exposed a long-running bribes-for-contracts racket at state-run oil firm Petrobras, the company is proclaiming it has cleaned up its act.
But interviews with six people with direct knowledge of the company’s graft-busting efforts, including former Chief Compliance Officer João Elek Jr., paint a picture of an organization still struggling to root out bad behavior. “There was great cultural resistance” to graft probes, said Elek, who led the Petrobras compliance department from January 2015 through April 2018. A former AT&T Inc executive, Elek described his departure from Petrobras as amicable and said it was never meant to be a long-term post.
Petrobras was alerted to potential problems in its trading operation since at least 2014, when a whistleblower went public with claims that the energy giant was overpaying for some of its oil purchases. The alleged scheme was also cited by two former Petrobras executives and a former senator in subsequent plea deals with prosecutors.
Petrobras said one reason the firm could not break up the suspected oil-trading racket earlier was that it lacked surveillance resources reserved for authorities, such as phone wiretaps and access to bank accounts to follow the money. Petrobras has steadfastly portrayed itself as a victim of illegal schemes perpetrated by a few rogue insiders colluding with unscrupulous contractors and greedy politicians. It downplayed the significance of the December indictments, saying they relate to alleged bribes paid years ago.
Elek, the former compliance chief, said Petrobras has taken meaningful steps to prevent a repeat. Supplier vetting has gotten much tougher, he said, and there is now better tracking of project budgets and spending. Elek said the modest size of his internal investigations team also hampered some compliance work. He said he started with just two subordinates in the investigations unit in 2015, building it to around 40 employees by the time of his departure in 2018.
The company also said it took steps late last year to make it easier to punish workers found to be involved in corruption, fraud or harassment. Bendine was disdainful of the compliance committee and never attended one of its meetings, one person with direct knowledge of the situation said.
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