Either Zeinal Bava or Ricardo Salgado is lying, or more probably both. Salgado’s explanation is that the €18.5 million transferred to PT Chief Bava’s offshore account was to lock him into the company while Bava dealt with the reorganisation of the Brazilian telecoms operator, Oi.
Ricardo Salgado explained to judge Carlos Alexandre that the payment to Zeinal Bava (pictured) was "extra money" to "capture" or lock in the former PT chief executive and his “top class team.”
This explanation of the multi-million transfer from Salgados’ ES Enterprises (illicit bung) company is at odds with the explanation given by Bava, namely that the money was to be used to buy PT shares on behalf of himself and other PT directors and managers.
Ricardo Salgado gave the order to transfer €18.5 million to a Bava’s personal account between 2010 and 2011. Bava claims to have later returned the money as the share allocation never went ahead.
The purpose of the money, according to Salgado, was "to prevent the top people at PT from working for competing companies," including the possible exit of Zeinal Bava to one of the Mexican telecoms billionaire Carlos Slim’s companies.
During the July 2015 hearing in front of judge Carlos Alexandre in the Mont Blanc money-laundering case, Ricardo Salgado did not once suggest that the payment to Bava was to finance the acquisition of PT shares.
This contradiction has been picked up by the Portuguese language press today and shows that Bava or Salgado has been 'economical with the truth.’
Bava said of the €18.5 million last month that “the subject of the contract was to finance the acquisitions of PT shares,” adding that the "purpose of the trust allocation did not come to be realised …capital and interest, as provided for in the contract, were fully returned."
Salgado says it was an unofficial bung, or under-the-table ‘golden handcuffs’ arrangement to lock in Bava and his team who, as the transfer was from an offshore account to another offshore account, would then be fully under Salgado’s control.
