Lava Jato scandal: Macri intelligence chief Gustavo Arribas collected $594,000 in Odebrecht bribes

[tenorly]

Last edited Thu Jan 12, 2017, 12:17 AM - Edit history (1)

The Director of Argentina's Federal Intelligence Agency (AFI), Gustavo Arribas, was discovered to have received $594,518 in bribes from Brazilian construction giant Odebrecht in 2013.

The bribe, collected before Argentine President Mauricio Macri appointed Arribas head of the AFI by decree in December 2015, is reportedly part of the Lava Jato (Car Wash) corruption scandal currently rocking Brazil.

Arribas, who lived in Brazil at the time, negotiated the sale of numerous Argentine football (soccer) players to European teams on behalf of Boca Juniors, a leading Argentine team partly owned by Macri. He currently resides in an apartment rented from Macri.

Revealed by investigative journalist Hugo Alconada Mon for the conservative Buenos Aires news daily La Nación, the payment involved five transfers totaling $594,518 between September 25 and 27, 2013, to Arribas' Swiss account from a Hong Kong account controlled by Odebrecht through the a cutout, RFY Import & Export Limited.

These payments took place the day after the announcement of a massive, $3 billion project for converting the Sarmiento commuter train line connecting Buenos Aires to its western suburbs into an underground line - a contract awarded to a consortium including Odebrecht and the Macri family's public works construction concern, IECSA.

IECSA's titular head since 2007, Ángelo Calcaterra, is a first of cousin of President Macri. The Macri administration has come under fire for awarding large public contracts for to IECSA throughout 2016, as well as for recently granting Calcaterra a permit to acquire a Cayman Islands bank (Banco Interfinanzas) that exists on paper only.

President Macri himself has been tied to 50 undeclared offshore bank accounts since the Panama Papers scandal become public this April.

Odebrecht CEO Marcelo Odebrecht was sentenced in March to 20 years in prison for distributing $600 million in bribes between 2007 and 2014 to officials in 12 countries, of which Argentine officials received $35 million.

At: https://translate.google.com/translate?sl=auto&tl=en&js=y&prev=_t&hl=en&ie=UTF-8&u=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.politicargentina.com%2Fnotas%2F201701%2F18800-el-jefe-de-inteligencia-de-macri-cobro-us600000-de-la-brasilena-odebrecht-investigada-por-sobornos-millonarios.html&edit-text=&act=url

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Macri and his fixer, Arribas.[/center]

[Judi Lynn]

1. That smooth transaction, breaking up the bribe into 5 pieces should've fooled em!

Over half a million $s in 2 days.

How many ways can you leave your morals? These things just keep revealing themselves, they can't keep them hidden (we hope).

This opportunist has been planted as the Director of Argentina's Federal Intelligence Agency. It seems impossible! How could anyone not laugh, swearing him into office?

Makes one's head spin, reading the article, trying to keep up with the astonishing criminality.

Tenorly, it almost seems time to make bets on which President is dirtier: Trump or Macri! They are both such filthy clowns.

It surely doesn't look so good for either country if they aren't catapulted from office this year. These men are enemies of the human race.

Love the photo of Arribas striking yet another pose. What a silly man. What they both should be wearing is orange jump suits!

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[tenorly]

2. Ah, wither the thought!

Among most Latin American right-wingers, Napoleon is a deeply hated figure - mainly thanks to decades of indoctrination by Roman Catholic hard-liners, who still resent Napoleon for breaking up the almost feudal control the church had over much of France, Italy, and Spain (including vast farms which were basically slave plantations, often manned by orphans the church bought and sold - and often abused sexually - very much like slaves were in Dixie).

As for Señor Arribas, his becoming a liability for Macri as quickly as he has is no surprise at all. His designation as intelligence chief - by decree - was fairly shocking in itself, considering he was basically Macri's sports agent and had no intelligence experience in the least (except, possibly, wiretapping the athletes themselves).

Macri merely wanted a personal toadie in the post - very much like Trump does. They do indeed resemble each other, don't they.