RIO DE JANEIRO (AP) – Rio de Janeiro state police arrested outgoing mayor Marcelo Crivella on Tuesday in connection with an alleged retreat plan, another show of political unrest in Brazil’s postcard city.
The evangelical bishop turned politician is scheduled to leave office on January 1, after losing a re-election offer in a landslide in front of his predecessor, Eduardo Paes. The defeat came despite support from President Jair Bolsonaro, who drew widespread support from evangelical congregations.
Crivella, 63, was an unlikely leader for the famous libertine city, but in 2016 she sailed on a wave of conservative support driven by a massive corruption investigation until the election victory. In office, he made headlines to break with tradition and distance himself from the popular popularity of the carnival.
Investigations earlier this year showed that Crivella maintained close ties with Rafael Alves, a businessman who was also arrested on Tuesday.
Investigators said Alves had decided which companies would win contracts and promised to award them in exchange for payments. Alves never held an official position, but his brother was the head of the city’s tourist office and held frequent meetings with Crivella.
Police officers arrived at Crivella’s home at 6 a.m., local TV records said. In September, they also visited the mayor’s house and office to collect documents related to the investigation.
Crivella told reporters on his arrival at the Rio police headquarters that his arrest was unfair. He also linked it to his willingness to fight against corporate interests and lobbyists.
“I am the mayor who fought the most against corruption,” Crivella said as he walked into Rio police headquarters.
Jorge Felippe, president of the Rio city council, will take office while Crivella is imprisoned. Deputy Mayor Fernando MacDowell died of a heart attack in 2018.
Elected mayor Paes wrote on Twitter that he was in touch with Felippe and asked him to mobilize municipal workers and ensure a smooth transition. He urged health workers in the city network to continue to help the population through the pandemic.
After the pandemic, Crivella introduced a step-by-step strategy to reopen the economy. Health experts at the time welcomed the step-by-step approach, but expressed fear that it would implement it too soon.
Earlier this month, the city’s seven-day average of confirmed cases reached its highest level since June. It has since fallen, but the number of hospitalizations in the city remains high, according to official data.
At one point, during the pandemic, municipal employees were filmed during hospitals and derailed local media interviews with family members of COVID-19 patients.
Crivella has repeatedly said during his re-election campaign that Paes, who was mayor when Rio hosted the 2016 Olympics, will be imprisoned if elected because of other investigations.
Crivella has not faced any allegations of corruption in his administration’s pandemic response. However, the governor of Rio, Wilson Witzel, was suspended from office in August, when one of the top courts in Brazil linked him to irregularities in health spending to fight COVID-19.
Witzel is also struggling with indictment proceedings, which could offer the job to another person under investigation, Deputy Governor Cláudio Castro.
Corruption investigations in recent years have led to the imprisonment of five of Rio’s former governors. One of them remains behind bars.
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Savarese reported from Sao Paulo. Associated Press writer David Biller contributed from Rio de Janeiro.