Bill to crack down on private corruption moves forward

Brazil’s Senate Public Security Committee approved a bill intended to define private corruption as a felony. The bill will proceed to a vote in the key Constitution and Justice Committee.

The bill uses language similar to the one employed in Brazil’s Criminal Code to define corruption by public agents. Private corruption is defined as “demanding, requesting or receiving undue advantage” as an employee or representative of a private business or institution in exchange for doing or failing to do something job-related that causes a loss to the company.

The bill calls for a prison sentence of two to five years, compared to the current punishment of two to 12 years for crimes in the public sector.

Senator Styvenson Valentim of the northeastern state of Rio Grande do Norte drafted the report of two different bills authored by fellow senators Marcos do Val and Alessandro Vieira. Mr. Valentim noted that Brazil ratified the 2003 United Nations Convention against Corruption, which stipulates that member States “shall take measures, in accordance with the fundamental principles of its domestic law, to prevent corruption involving the private sector.”

In his draft, Mr. Valentim wrote that private corruption harms society as a whole because spending on undue advantages requested by administrators, employees, and representatives of private companies bears a burden on end consumers. He added that private corruption “compromises trust in a business relationship and, consequently, scares away domestic and foreign investors.”

The bill was approved without a vote. Senator Sergio Moro, the former judge of Operation Car Wash fame, said during the hearing that the draft is “very positive.”

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