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After testifying before the members of the investigatory commission installed in the Brazilian Chamber of Deputies, the entrepreneur, Sebastião Augusto Buani denied having bribed the president of the Chamber, Severino Cavalcanti, in order to keep his restaurant concession in the Chamber.
"I don't even have money to pay my bills, much less to afford bribes. I didn't pay anyone off," Buani said.
The entrepreneur also denied having denounced the bribe payments to the press.
"Up to now I haven't denounced anything. I just read about the accusations."
In his interview after the session with the investigatory commission, when asked whether the accusations published in weekly news magazines Veja and Época were "a mistake," Buani evidenced irritation and added:
"I have nothing to say. I will deliver my complete testimony to the Federal Police."
According to Buani, the accusations were made by a former employee, Zeilton Carvalho, who, the entrepreneur informed, quit, of his own accord, the firm that runs the restaurant on the tenth floor of the Chamber. In Buani's view, the former employee made the accusations in exchange for financial rewards.
Regarding accusations that he tried to extort the president of the Chamber, Buani said that the deputy "will have to prove it, because I never did it."
The entrepreneur's lawyer, Sebastião Coelho da Silva, reaffirmed that no sort of extortion entered into Buani's contract with the Chamber, for a monthly fee exceeding US$ 4,910 (11,500 reais).
And he assured that no arrangement between the entrepreneur and the president of the Chamber "was struck, nor is it being struck."
Agência Brasil
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