Thread: Brazil deputy tourism minister Costa, 37 others, arrested

9 August 2011 Last updated at 15:11 ET

Brazil deputy tourism minister Costa arrested

President Dilma Rousseff has lost three high-ranking officials to corruption scandals

Brazilian Deputy Tourism Minister Frederico Silva da Costa and 37 other officials from the ministry have been arrested on corruption charges.

The police said they conspired to divert public money for private gain, charges they deny.

Almost 200 police took part in the operation to detain the suspects.

Mr Costa is the third high-ranking official to leave his post over corruption allegations since President Dilma Rousseff took power in January.

Prosecutors said the suspects had awarded contracts at inflated prices to complicit firms that often were not qualified to carry out the work.

The officials were arrested in the cities of Brasilia, Sao Paulo and Macapa.

The arrests come in the wake of allegations of corruption at the ministries of agriculture and transport.

Prosecutors seized a number of computers at the agriculture ministry on Monday, and Agriculture Minister Wagner Rossi has been asked to appear before an ethics commission to answer the allegations.

Mr Rossi is a member of the Democratic Movement Party of Brazil (PMDB), President Rousseff's largest ally in Congress.

Last month, Transport Minister Alfredo Nascimento and more than 20 officials resigned over allegations of kickbacks at the ministry of transport.

Mr Nascimento stepped down after a magazine alleged staff at his ministry were skimming off money from federal infrastructure contracts.

And in June, the president's chief of staff Antonio Palocci resigned after press reports questioned his rapid accumulation of wealth.

Brazilian paper Folha de Sao Paulo said Mr Palocci's net worth had increased 20-fold in four years.

All have denied any wrongdoing.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-14468217

Gosh, I wonder if we could get those prosecutors to come over here and clean things up like they are doing in Brazil? We don't seem to have any of our own that will step up to the plate. They could start

"Top down, bottom up, inside out"....
Van Jones