Word: lula
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: during 2000-2009
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
...influence, was convicted on corruption charges, sentenced to 10 years in prison, and fined R$ 12 million ($5 million). Mr. Dantas’ fate remains unclear as he may still file multiple appeals that could take years to be evaluated. Nevertheless, his conviction reflects an accomplishment of the Lula administration in Brazil: the freedom of the Polícia Federal, responsible for gathering the evidence in the case. The PF has been allowed to aggressively pursue corruption investigations since 2003 and numerous prosecutions show that Brazil’s institutional modernization process remains strong, despite the chaos in the global...
...well-known reforms in monetary policy, another Cardoso legacy was the restructuring of the Federal Revenue, which helped to ameliorate Brazil’s problem with tax collection. The FR beat collection records in all but the first of the Cardoso years. Just as Cardoso transformed the Federal Revenue, Lula is transforming the Federal Police. Today, the RF is a milestone in efficiency, even if it is still no IRS. The PF may be as successful, even if it falls short of FBI standards...
...country alone and all at once. The PF was dishearteningly quiet in that period. The Prosecutor General was mockingly dubbed the Archivist General in critical opinion articles, so many were the cases supposedly locked away in drawers. The Dantas case, however, makes it clear that this has changed under Lula. The PF has been more active than ever...
...negative side. Arrests become spectacles on national television, narrated by reporters on police captains’ speed dials. A general fear of wiretapping, legal and illegal, takes over the political and business classes. Nevertheless, corruption is being attacked day in and day out. The skeptical observer should still praise Lula for letting the PF do its job. After all, investigations have all too often gotten dangerously close to people around the president himself...
...anything beyond initiating a very long and still murky effort to address some of the factors that led to the rot and implosion of U.S. financial markets and its contamination abroad. "We are not hoping for much from the G-20 meeting," admitted Brazilian President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva on Tuesday. "It is only the start, even if it is a promising...