The Brazilian Minister of Education submitted his resignation to the president yesterday, Monday, as he was targeted by an investigation for unfair influence in exchange for the benefit of evangelical pastors, political allies of the government.
The resignation made available to him by Milton Hebeiro, the same evangelical pastor, was accepted by President Zaich Bolsonaro and published in the Official Government Gazette.
The scandal erupted when the Folha de S. Paulo newspaper revealed last week that the education minister had promised to give priority grants to municipal schools run by “friends” of two influential evangelical pastors, at the request of the president.
According to the Brazilian press, one of these pastors went so far as to demand that the mayor give him a one-kilo gold bar in order to mediate in order to be given subsidies.
The revelations prompted the Supreme Court to launch an investigation into the minister.
“I have asked the president to step down so that there is not the slightest suspicion of my actions, nor of those of the government,” the minister said in his resignation letter, published by the Brazilian press on Monday.
Mr. Khimpeiro was President Bolsonaro’s third Minister of Education. The government of the leader of the Brazilian far right has been tested for more than three years by an avalanche of resignations and expulsions.
Education is, along with Health, the most problematic portfolio in Brazil of Zaich Bolsonaro: in the field of Health there have been three dismissals or resignations of ministers, mainly due to disagreements with the head of state to deal with the pandemic of the new coronavirus.
The departure of the Minister of Education was recorded while Zaich Bolsonarou has now officially entered the initial stage of his campaign in view of the October presidential elections, in which he will claim his re-election. The far-right politician was elected promising to eradicate corruption, endemic to Brazil.
President Bolsonaro is well behind Luis Inacio’s left-wing predecessor, Lula da Silva, in opinion polls so far.
As he maintains close ties with the evangelicals, Mr. Bolsonaru tried last week to save his minister’s head, despite the scandal.
Mr. Khimpeirou denies his innocence.
But his stay in government was no longer possible, as several other ministers, alarmed by the blow to the government image in an election year, demanded he step down, a source close to the Brazilian presidency admitted, speaking to Agence France-Presse.
Political analyst Andre Cesar told Reuters that it was urgent for the Brazilian government to “check the damage as soon as possible before (the scandal) escalates, because every day the media made new revelations”.
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