New deputy director says Abin wants to clarify irregularities

The new deputy director of the Brazilian Intelligence Agency (Abin), Marco Cepik, said that Abin management sees with “calmness and enthusiasm” the possibility of clarifying possible irregularities in the agency's previous management.

“The management sees with the utmost tranquility and enthusiasm the complete clarification of what happened here during Ramagem’s management [deputado federal Alexandre Ramagem, ex-diretor-geral da Abin] and there is no risk of obstruction of this process by the administration”, he said in an exclusive interview with TV Brasilwhich aired on the program Reporter Brazil this Thursday (1st).

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Marco Cepik was appointed to the position after the dismissal of Alessandro Moretti, last Tuesday (30). The dismissal occurred after the Federal Police (PF) launched an operation to investigate an alleged clandestine information production scheme within Abin during the management of the then director and current federal deputy, Alexandre Ramagem (PL-RJ).

One of the targets of the investigation is councilor Carlos Bolsonaro (Republicanos-RJ), son of former president Jair Bolsonaro. Investigations have shown that opponents of the former president had been illegally monitored. On social media, federal deputy Eduardo Bolsonaro, brother of the councilor, classified the operation as an “illegal act, as well as “immoral”.

According to Cepik, his predecessor is not investigated and there is no type of suspicion regarding him. “But so that there is no doubt about this, the government and he decided to dismiss him.”

Regarding the possible participation of Abin employees in the irregularities, he said that, if this is an investigative hypothesis, it will be conducted by the Abin Internal Affairs Office, the General Internal Affairs Office of the Union and the Federal Police.

“If this tool was used, we want to know for what, when, why, for what purpose, it doesn't matter who it was, if they were older or younger employees, if they were federal police officers who were occupying commissioned positions here in the Ramagem administration, everything this will be duly clarified”, he pointed out.

Before being appointed to the position of deputy director, Cepik was director of the Abin Intelligence School. According to him, in March last year, Abin's management initiated an internal investigation, which was later transferred to the General Inspectorate of the Union, to investigate the misuse of geolocation tools such as spy software first mile and also other actions that were carried out under the previous management.

He also highlighted that it is of utmost interest to the institution to identify exactly what was done with the tool and which people may have been spied on, but this is a decision that the court will have to make. “In due course, the Federal Supreme Court and the courts will determine what information from the investigation should be made public and at what time, so that there is no prejudice to the correct investigation.”