Mônica Bergamo: Leader of truck drivers says Brazil has to stop against Petrobras increase

One of the main leaders of the 2018 truck drivers’ strike, Wanderlei Alves, aka Dedeco, says that Brazil has to stop in protest against the fuel increase announced this Thursday (10) by Petrobras – from 18.8% for gasoline, 16 .1% for cooking gas and 24.9% for diesel in refineries.

“Autonomous truck drivers and transport entrepreneurs have to unite and stop the country. Nobody will stand it. Carriers that have 500,000 trucks, with thousands of employees to pay, will go bankrupt”, says Dedeco.

In Mato Grosso, where the truck he is driving stopped to fill up and continue the journey to Presidente Prudente, in São Paulo, he says he paid R$ 6.8 per liter. “And now it goes to more than R$8”, he protests. The increases come into effect from Friday (11).

Dedeco says that Russia’s war against Ukraine is serving as an “excuse to enrich even more the owners of Petrobras”.

“They have already made an absurd profit, unhealthy with the most recent increases, and they are becoming millionaires at the expense of the tragedy of all of us. Only those who are happy in the country today are Petrobras investors”, he continues.

Dedeco says that truck drivers and carriers are the first to feel the blow, but soon the prices are passed on and arrive “on the supermarket shelves, in all products”, penalizing the Brazilian population.

At the beginning of last year, Dedeco announced that he had lost the three trucks he worked with after delaying the payment of their installments. The episode made him abandon the 27 years on the road and open a hamburger shop in Curitiba, where he lives.

He currently works at a company called Framento Transportes de Chapecó.

Affiliated with Podemos, the truck driver even engaged in the pre-campaign for the Presidency of Sergio Moro (Podemos), but broke up with the former minister and former judge after a disagreement in a WhatsApp group last month.

Named “Support to Sergio Moro”, the group has among its members figures such as the former head of the Lava Jato task force Deltan Dallagnol (Pode-PR) and Senator Álvaro Dias (Pode-PR).

As the Panel showed, Dedeco published a message in which he complained that Moro participated in the conversations, but that he stopped interacting after receiving charges for proposals aimed at truck drivers.

“We are here like a bunch of idiots betting on him, but he doesn’t even answer our questions he doesn’t answer,” he wrote.

“I already feel discouraged with Moro, I realize that he doesn’t have the courage or wants to talk about the category. It seems that we are a bunch of lepers, until today I haven’t seen him say anything in favor of our class. If he doesn’t have sympathy for truck drivers, doesn’t deserve the votes of our families. We will survive whoever the president is,” he added.

Moro then spoke up and said that he is in a rush that he can barely answer his own wife. He also stated that he has sympathy for truck drivers and that he is preparing his proposals for the category.

“I’m not going to do like Bolsonaro and Lula and promise what’s not possible and what they don’t deliver later. If I say I’m going to do X, I do it, I’m a person of my word, and my plan is to improve the economy for everyone, including for truck drivers and their families. If you want empty promises, stay there with whoever you want”, wrote the former judge.

“shovels [paz] and well, Wanderlei, I’ll leave the group if I’m to be offended by you”, he added.

Dedeco told the Panel that he was then blocked by Moro on his cell phone.

In a note this Thursday, Petrobras stated that the announcement comes after 57 days without readjustments. According to the company, this movement “goes in the same direction as other fuel suppliers in Brazil that have already promoted adjustments in their sales prices”.

“Despite the soaring prices of oil and its derivatives around the world, in recent weeks, as a result of the war between Russia and Ukraine, Petrobras decided not to pass on the market volatility immediately, carrying out a daily monitoring of oil prices” , said the state.

In the case of gasoline, the average price at refineries will rise from R$3.25 to R$3.86 per liter.

For diesel, the value will increase by almost R$ 1 per liter, from R$ 3.61 to R$ 4.51.

Petrobras also announced an adjustment in the prices of LPG, cooking gas. The average sale price for distributors will go from R$3.86 to R$4.48 per kilo.

For diesel, the increase is even greater, at 24.9%. The value will rise by almost R$ 1 per liter, from R$ 3.61 to R$ 4.51.

_{with BIANKA VIEIRA, KARINA MATIAS and MANOELLA SMITH}