Brazil Bar Association regrets nature of talks between Rousseff and ex-President
The national directors' board of Brazil's Bar Association, known as OAB, released in the early hours Thursday (Mar. 17) a note saying that the recorded conversations between former President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva and President Rousseff and other authorities reveal “a most bleak picture facing the country.”
The national directors' board of Brazil's Bar Association, known as OAB, released in the early hours Thursday (Mar. 17) a note saying that the recorded conversations between former President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva and President Rousseff and other authorities reveal “a most bleak picture facing the country.” The talks were made public after Federal Judge Sérgio Moro, spearheading Operation Car Wash, removes the secrecy on the inquiry over Lula a few hours after the presidential palace confirmed that the former president was to office as Chief of Staff.
In the statement, the organization makes no remarks on the release of conversations between Lula and one of his lawyers, Roberto Teixeira—a law infringement to a number of experts, as the privacy of the communication between lawyer and client must not be violated. In his decision, Moro explains he had not “clearly identified a lawyer-client relationship” between the two.
The Bar Association goes on to criticize “tactless, coarse, and disrespectful references to Brazil's Bar Association, the Federal Supreme Court and the National Congress, with the employment of unpronounceable terms, uttered by a person of note in the Republic.”
The association slated for Friday (18) an extraordinary meeting with its Federal Council in Brasília. In addition to discussing the current political landscape and planning what action should be taken, the meeting is expected to result in a general position regarding the publication of the lawyer Roberto Teixeira's conversation.
Reactions across the country
Unlike the national board of directors, OAB's office in Rio de Janeiro was critical of the release of the call between Lula and Rousseff. In a statement, the Rio branch expresses concern over weather or not the move was legal and the preservation of the rule of law. The press release further describes Judge Moro's actions as “typical of police-controlled States, where national sovereignty is put at risk. This should be spurned, as it would in any democratic republic in the world.”
OAB's Federal District branch, in turn, regarded the content of the dialogue between Lula and Rousseff as unacceptable and said that “democracy is jeopardized when the power of the State is used in defense of private interests.”
*Further reporting by Sayonara Moreno and Vitor Abdala.
Translated by Fabrício Ferreira
Fonte: Brazil Bar Association regrets nature of talks between Rousseff and ex-President Lula
