Corruption Scandals

A scene from The Simpsons episode "Blame it on Lisa." The family travels to Brazil and Homer gets kidnapped from an illegal taxi operation.  Photo from: http://vignette4.wikia.nocookie.net/simpsons/images/8/83/Kidnap-simpsons.jpg/revision/latest?cb=20131216210348

               Corruption is nothing new in Brazil.  Almost every time you see Brazil in the news, it is either an update on a corruption scandal, or they just discovered a brand new corruption scandal.

The corruption is bad enough, it actually was featured in two episodes of The Simpsons. (https://www.simpsonsworld.com/video/301665347899 and https://www.simpsonsworld.com/video/304489539783). Now The Simpsons is a fictional show, but it is based on events that actually do happen.

In 2014, Brazil actually passed a new law called the Clean Company Act (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Corruption_in_Brazil). This act holds companies responsible for their employee’s actions. But still, corruption is a major problem in Brazil.

In my most recent post, I shine the spotlight on the Brazillian Red Cross. (http://globalatmusa.blogspot.com/2015/10/another-scandal-in-brazil.html). Private auditors found this charity in the midst of $10 million embezzlement scandal.

In my first post, I talk about the economic situation in Brazil. (http://globalatmusa.blogspot.com/2015/09/brazil-is-officially-in-recession.html) One of the major contributors to the recession is the corruption scandal of their largest company, Petrobras, which is Latin America’s largest oil company.

Corruption is a real problem affecting real people. (http://www.nytimes.com/2015/08/09/business/international/effects-of-petrobras-scandal-leave-brazilians-lamenting-a-lost-dream.html) The investigation of Petrobras is hauling operations leaving Brazilian’s without work during a recession. Meanwhile, the executives are rolling in the dough with more money than they possibly know how to spend, other than to bribe officials. This obviously angers citizens nationwide, so they are out on the streets protesting. Then, whenever one of their big shots is arrested, they hold major celebrations.

Corruption is a major cause of the current recession they are facing. It is having real effects on the economy. Their economic ratings have been plummeting due to the recent scandals. (http://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2015/08/17/brazils-corruption-scandal-economy-drive-rousseffs-ratings-to-record-low/)

Another scandal that hit the headlines was over the FIFA World cup. Soccer (as they call it Football) is probably as big is American Football is in the United States. Con artists were all over this event bribing officials this rigging the games. (http://www.espnfc.us/blog/espn-fc-united-blog/68/post/2486642/world-cup-a-year-on-going-back-to-brazil) That second episode of The Simpsons I mentioned makes fun of that situation. The thing is, that is a real situation, and it is no laughing matter.

Brazil has a horrible reputation when it comes to corruption.  People are rapidly losing trust in Brazil. People should be very careful when doing any business in Brazil, because there is likely a scam artist trying to interfere with the action. People in Brazil need to work with their government to improve transparency, create and fairly enforce new laws to clean their act up. Before anything can get better in Brazil, officials need to clean up their act.

Brandon Fredman