Mônica Bergamo: President of Petrobras will resign this Monday (20), says government

The government of Jair Bolsonaro (PL) over the weekend intensified the pressure on the president of Petrobras, José Mauro Coelho, and believes he should resign from his position later this Monday (20).

The information was given to the column by a government minister, and confirmed with a member of the company’s board. The current president, therefore, would have capitulated to the pressure, accepting to resign without waiting for a shareholders’ meeting to remove him from the position.

Wanted, Mauro Coelho did not respond to the call. His office also did not respond.

On May 24, the president announced that he would change the command of the state-owned company and indicated the name of the then secretary of Debureaucratization of the Ministry of Economy, Caio Mário Paes de Andrade, to replace the current president of the company.

Mauro Coelho, however, had so far decided to resist the post: according to the company’s rules, he could only be replaced by an extraordinary shareholders’ meeting, which does not yet have a date to take place. Due to the complexity of the company, it can take up to 60 days to complete.

Therefore, a month after the announcement, Bolsonaro still had the displeasure of seeing Mauro Coelho in office.

The situation worsened last week after the oil company announced another increase, of 14.26% for diesel and 5.18% for gasoline.

Bolsonaro said the company could “plunge Brazil into chaos”, provoking a truck drivers’ strike along the lines of the one that paralyzed the country in 2018.

The center increased the pressure on Petrobras to the maximum level. The president of the Chamber of Deputies, Arthur Lira, said he would go to “the stick”, opening a CPI against the state-owned company and taxing its profits.

One of the advisers representing private shareholders even sent a letter to government ministers trying to open a negotiation channel, in vain.