SAO BERNARDO DO CAMPO (Brazil): The stories have both transfixed and enraged the Brazilian public in recent days: suitcases stuffed with cash, backroom payouts to lawmakers, a governing party allegedly buying support for its agenda.

Last week, a congressman testified that top aides to President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva knew that the Workers’ Party — the bedrock of Lula’s political base — was offering millions of dollars in bribes to legislators. Lula denied knowing about the payouts, but the probe has raised difficult questions for a man who in 2002 received more votes than any presidential candidate in the nation’s history.

“People don’t necessarily think of Lula as corrupt, because he says he didn’t know what was going on,” said Jose Luciano de Mattos Dias, a political scientist at the Research University of Rio de Janeiro. “But that is the point: He didn’t know. What else doesn’t he know?”

The crisis developed two weeks ago when a Brazilian magazine obtained a videotape of a postal service manager appearing to accept a bribe from a businessman who was competing for a government contract. On the tape, the postal manager said such payments were widespread and named congressman Roberto Jefferson as one of those accepting bribes.

Jefferson, president of the Brazilian Labor Party, denied wrongdoing, and Lula publicly supported him. But the statements Jefferson has made to try to clear his name have elevated a small-time scandal into a full-blown crisis for the president.

Jefferson testified last week that Lula’s party offered each Labour delegate $12,500 per month to support its initiatives. Jefferson said he refused the bribe but knew that some lawmakers had taken the cash. He said Lula’s chief of staff and finance minister knew of the payouts and said he told Lula of the bribes earlier this year.

“The president was shocked, and tears fell from his eyes,” Jefferson told a congressional panel. “President Lula is innocent. He put a stop to the bribery.” Lula’s public tone since the scandal broke has been firm, promising a full investigation and a package of anti-corruption reforms. On Thursday, he accepted the resignation of his chief of staff, Jose Dirceu, who was implicated by Jefferson in the scandal.

“We will leave no stone unturned,” Lula vowed in his weekly radio programme. “As the father of five children, I am infuriated by corruption that misuses money that could be used to help develop this country. We need to show Brazilian society that it is possible to abolish corruption for good.”

While most Brazilians appear unwilling to hold Lula personally accountable for the alleged bribery, faith in the government and its ability to control corruption has eroded. Although Lula, 59, remains personally popular, recent opinion polls show his public support has dropped.

Before he became president, Lula regularly held court at the Bar da Rosa, a smoky cafe in this blue-collar neighbourhood outside Sao Paulo. Each morning he dropped in to read the paper, and in the evenings he filled the room with the machinists and auto workers he represented in the Worker’s Party.

Adailton Pinheiros, a retired auto worker, voted once for Lula to lead his union and a second time for him to lead the country.

“Now everyone’s complaining, and I am, too,” said Pinheiros, 50, who said corruption seemed ingrained in Brazilian politics. “If the election were today, I don’t know that I would vote for Lula.” Perhaps it’s lucky for Lula that the election isn’t today. The economy was sluggish before the scandal broke, and in a survey released two weeks ago, about 45 per cent of Brazilians responded negatively when asked to evaluate Lula’s administration.

But few in Brazil are writing off Lula. The one-time lathe operator has built an unlikely political career out of overcoming obstacles and defying expectations. Although his personal approval ratings have fallen for three consecutive months, polls show he would trounce any of a number of possible presidential contenders.

Lula still keeps his apartment in Sao Bernardo, and the district contains other landmarks from his career: the metal workers’ headquarters where he organized picket lines; the soccer stadium where he rallied thousands during a general strike; the jail where he was incarcerated in 1980 for leading a work stoppage.

The obstacles Lula experienced on his road to the presidency included the death of his pregnant first wife, a factory accident that claimed a finger and three presidential defeats between 1989 and 1998. —Dawn/LAT-WP News Service