See who are the eight Bolsonarista businessmen targeted by the PF

The Federal Police executes search warrants this Tuesday morning (23) against businessmen involved in messages that defend a coup d’état if former president Lula (PT) defeats Jair Bolsonaro (PL) in the presidential elections.

The coup-type conversations took place in a WhatsApp group and were revealed by the Metrópoles website.

Among the targets are Luciano Hang, from Havan, José Isaac Peres (Multiplan mall chain), Ivan Wrobel (Construtora W3), José Koury (Barra World Shopping), André Tissot (Sierra Group), Meyer Nigri (Tecnisa), Marco Aurélio Raimundo (Mormaii) and Afrânio Barreira (Coco Bambu Group).

Luciano Hang (Havan)

The 59-year-old businessman owns the retailer Havan and has been a prominent Bolsonaro supporter since 2018. That year, he even published a video saying that there were polls of voting intentions among his employees and that, if the PT won the election, the retailer could stop creating jobs.

During Bolsonaro’s term, Hang was investigated by the Covid CPI for his alleged involvement in the so-called parallel cabinet, the president’s advisory structure for pandemic issues outside the structure of the Ministry of Health.

During his testimony to the commission, he acknowledged that he campaigned with businessmen in his city, Brusque (SC), to buy medicines from the “Covid kit”, which had no scientific proof and were donated to hospitals.

In a note, Hang said that his message in the WhatsApp group was as follows: “Four more years of Bolsonaro, eight more of Tarcísio and then there will be no more room for these bums”.

“I never talked about the STF (Federal Supreme Court) or a coup,” he said. “I am part of a group of 250 businessmen, from different political currents, and each one has his point of view. As far as I know, in Brazil, there is still no crime of thought and opinion.”

José Isaac Peres (Multiplan)

Peres, 82, founder and shareholder of Multiplan, is also on the WhatsApp group. According to the mall’s website, the entrepreneur created his first company, the developer Veplan, at the age of 22. Multiplan would be created in 1975, and its capital, opened in 2007.

He would have said, according to a report in Metrópoles, that polls for voting intentions are manipulated and that the TSE has PT ministers.

The businessman still questioned the fairness of the last elections, repeating a speech by Bolsonaro that is refuted by experts.

The company’s adviser has not yet commented.

Ivan Wrobel (W3 Constructor)

Wrobel owns the construction company W3, a small company focused on high-end commercial and residential real estate in Rio de Janeiro. The businessman had no media appearances until the WhatsApp group was revealed.

There, Wrobel would have started the discussion that gave rise to the coup messages when he questioned whether the STF would have the courage to rig elections after a military parade on Avenida Atlântica, in Rio de Janeiro.

The act had been announced by Bolsonaro days earlier.

“We want, for the first time, to innovate in Rio de Janeiro. (…) At 4 pm on September 7, for the first time, our Armed Forces and our sisters, auxiliary forces, will be parading on Copacabana beach alongside our people,” he said during the Republicans’ national convention.

The report was unable to contact the company or the entrepreneur.

José Koury (Barra World Shopping)

The businessman owns Barra World Shopping, which is located in Barra da Tijuca, Rio de Janeiro, and calls itself “the world’s first themed mall”.

In the WhatsApp group, he would have said he preferred a coup d’état than the return of the PT. The businessman would also have stated that other countries would not stop doing business with Brazil, as they do in dictatorships around the world.

In a note sent by his advisor, Koury said he was not a conspirator or in favor of coups. “Messages obtained from a private WhatsApp group of friends have been misrepresented in their meaning and context,” he said.

André Tissot (Sierra Group)

Luiz André Tissot, 66, is president of the Sierra Móveis group, specialized in luxury furniture. The company’s headquarters are in Gramado, in the mountains of Rio Grande do Sul, where the Federal Police’s searches were concentrated this morning. The entrepreneur comes from a family with a tradition in the manufacture of wooden articles in the region.

According to the newspaper Zero Hora, in 2018, the group was denounced by the MPT (Ministry of Labor) for attempting electoral coercion, after having sent a letter to officials expressing concern about the course of the presidential election, in addition to pointing out reasons for the vote for Jair Bolsonaro.

The Justice accepted the MPT’s complaint and ordered the group to send a new written communication to the employees informing them that they had the right to freely choose their candidates. The message should also inform about the illegality “of campaigning for or against a certain candidate, coercing, intimidating, admonishing or influencing the vote of its employees, with abuse of directive power”.

Sierra was born in 1990 as an importer of high-end furniture signed by Italian designers. Today, the company has around 70 stores in Brazil, including its own and multi-brand stores, as well as point-of-sale units in Chile, Argentina, Panama, Paraguay, Peru and the Dominican Republic. According to the company, the solid wood used in the production of its furniture, doors and windows is extracted in a renewable way, from reforestation.

wanted by Sheetthe company said through its press office that it will not comment on the matter, as well as Tissot.

Meyer Nigri (Tecnisa)

The grandson of Lebanese Jews, graduated in engineering from Escola Politécnica da USP (University of São Paulo), businessman Meyer Joseph Nigri founded Tecnisa in 1977. Today, at 66, he heads the board of directors of the company, one of the largest construction companies in the country, but was in the executive command of the group until 2017.

Tecnisa has seen better moments. It has not had an annual profit for at least five years. Recently, about a third of employees have been cut.

In 2020, Meyer Nigri caught Covid and spent 160 days hospitalized. He lost 38 pounds. In an interview with the Broadcast news agency, he said that “there were times when he would rather be leaving”. The executive himself said at the time that he was contaminated at a dinner with friends of President Jair Bolsonaro at the Israeli Embassy in Brasília.

Meyer Nigri met Bolsonaro through his son Renato, who became friends with Eduardo Bolsonaro, the president’s son. The businessman says he admires Bolsonaro, who he considers “a very correct guy, good, patriotic and well-intentioned”, according to the interview with Broadcast.

It has an active role in the Jewish community. He is a member of the Deliberative Council of Chevra Kadisha (an association that manages Israeli cemeteries in São Paulo), of the Hospital Israelita Albert Einstein and chairs the board of directors of Espaço K (a third sector organization focused on the Jewish youth community).

When contacted, Tecnisa informed, through its press office, that it “only takes care of matters related to Tecnisa” and “does not provide private advice to Meyer Nigri”.

Marco Aurelio Raymundo (Mormaii)

The businessman Marco Aurélio Raymundo, president of Mormaii, is a doctor from Rio Grande do Sul, from Guaíba. Known as Morongo, the 73-year-old businessman founded Mormaii in 1976, offering wetsuits to surfers facing icy seas, starting at Garopaba beach (SC), where Mormaii was born.

In an interview with Forbes magazine, he claimed to have a zen style, balancing work with surfing, pilates and music.

Questioned by Sheet, Morongo’s defense stated that the businessman was contacted today by the Federal Police, but still does not know the full content of the investigation. According to the defense, Morongo “has placed himself and remains at the disposal of all authorities for clarification”.

Afrânio Barreira (Coco Bambu Group)

The founder of the restaurant chain Coco Bambu became known at the beginning of the pandemic for his defense of chloroquine and Bolsonaro’s position on social isolation.

According to Veja São Paulo, he said in May 2020, by WhatsApp message, that for part of the population “it is very easy to defend the lockdown or horizontal social isolation”. “After all, having a comfortable home, food in the fridge, and even indoor entertainment makes it easier,” he said.

At the time, supporters of the president were still defending the possibility of “vertical isolation”, only for risk groups.

After making mass layoffs during the pandemic, the restaurant plans new restaurants in Brasília, Sorocaba (SP), São José do Rio Preto (SP), Rio de Janeiro, Jundiaí (SP), Campo Grande and in the Jardins neighborhood, in São Paulo, according to an interview given by the businessman to Sheet.

He would have responded to scammer messages with applause stickers.

“I am absolutely calm, as my only manifestation on the subject was an ’emoji’ signaling the reading of the message, without endorsing or agreeing with its content”, said the businessman in a statement. “I trust justice and we will prove that I have always been totally in favor of democracy. I have never defended, verbalized, thought or written in favor of any anti-democratic movement or coup. Thus, I am in favor of freedom, democracy and a fair electoral process.”