Threats of dismissal, promises of break and even ham distribution. Survey made by Sheet In the Labor Court shows that companies from various Brazilian states have already been convicted of helping () in the election of 2022, trying to influence and manipulate the vote of their employees and collaborators.
With roots in the halter vote imposed by the colonels in the Old Republic (1889-1930), the so-called electoral harassment motivated, in the last presidential election, a series of lawsuits. The report had access to 30 recent judgments, in the first or second instance, in which companies were considered guilty of conduct that alternates promises of benefits with pressure, intimidation and coercion.
Declared ineligible by the (Superior Electoral Court) by 2030 and currently under house arrest, Bolsonaro will still be tried by the (Federal Supreme Court) on charges of attempted coup at the end of his government to try to avoid the President’s inauguration (PT).
In Minas Gerais, Agronelli Ltda. He was punished for having, according to Judge Marcelo belongs, sought to “influence and manipulate the right of political choice of employees”.
According to the lawsuit, the company has stickers with the name of Bolsonaro on employee tables and computers and promoted lectures on the then president. One director also said that if the PT won the election, the company would be harmed and the employees fired.
Concluded to pay $ 10,000 to a former employee, Agronelli resorted. He told court that “he never coerced, intimidated or influenced his employees’ vote” and that he never forced his employees to put Bolsonaro stickers on their vehicles or workplaces.
At Radiodoc (SP), a company representative, according to the lawsuit, said employees “suffering the consequences” if they did not vote for Bolsonaro.
The company even promised a break for those who participated in Bolsonaro’s campaign event. Sentenced in two instances, the company “vehemently” denied the facts reported to the court.
In Sada Bioenergia and Agriculture (MG), a 12 -year -old driver was fired at age 64 for refusing to wear a Bolsonaro sticker. He told the person who distributed the campaign material that was Lula’s voter.
“Respect for the formation of political conviction in an autonomous and free way is an essential condition for democracy,” said Judge Marco Aurélio de Carvalho in condemning the exit. She told court that the dismissal was already expected to occur and that there was no harassment.
In Paraná, Transben Transportes was convicted of, according to Judge Camila de Almeida, to have sent a video to the employees expressly asking them to vote for Bolsonaro.
“If Lula wins will have unemployment. Our company will suffer a lot,” said the representative. In the recording, he also said that the driver who was going to vote for Bolsonaro would receive a “aid” to be able to return to his cities on election day. In the defense presented to the court, the company said that “it has always respected the political preference of its employees.”
In Espírito Santo, Febracis was ordered to pay an indemnity of $ 10,000 for trying to coerce an administrative assistant to vote for Bolsonaro. The pressure, according to the process, was increasing with the approach of the second round. The company said the election was a “spiritual war.” Bolsonaro would be the envoy of God and Lula, the devil.
“The usual behavior of the hierarchical superior cannot be considered tolerable in a corporate environment,” Judge Soares Heringer said in the decision. The company told court that “it never exercised any kind of political and ideological persecution in the face of its employees.”
Betim’s Serradão (MG) refrigerator, according to an action opened by a Magarefe (a professional who slaughter animals), distributed yellow t -shirts to workers with a Bolsonaro slogan and promised to grant a leg of hang man who proved to have voted in the then president.
“Videos [anexados ao processo] They clearly demonstrate the meeting at the company’s premises, and the yellow standardization of employees, all dressed in clear support to a particular candidate imposed by the company, “said Judge Augusto Alvarenga in the sentence.
Serradão, when defending herself, said she did not force any workers to wear the yellow t -shirt and never offered any advantage for those who vote for Bolsonaro.
Eneida Desiree Salgado, Professor of Constitutional and Electoral Law at the Federal University of Paraná, who has work on the issue of electoral harassment, says that in small towns, for positions such as councilor and deputy, it is common for companies to check the voting map to find out if, in the electoral zone of his employee, there was a vote in the nominated candidate.
“As well as the halter vote in the context of the First Republic’s coronelismo phenomenon, what is at stake is not just the freedom of a vote. With the existence of electoral harassment, all the fairness of the system is endangered,” he says.
A report from the Labor Public Prosecution Service pointed to the receipt of 3,145 allegations of electoral harassment in the 2022 dispute, which represents only the tip of an iceberg, since, in the face of fear of losing their jobs, many harasses prefer to maintain silence.
A survey by Datafolha in 2022 recorded that.
The MPT signed at the time of election 560 Conduct Adjustment Terms with companies and opened 105 public civil actions. One of them was moved against Piauí’s SLC Agrícola SA, which was convicted in the second instance to pay R $ 100,000 for collective moral damages for imposing an atypical scale to make it difficult for workers to vote in the second round. Lula had obtained more than 74% of the votes in the state in the first round.
According to the sentence, 34 employees were called to work on a farm, far from the voting places, against only two on previous Sundays. In addition, the company did not offer transportation so that they could move in time to vote. Judge Marco Caminha said in the decision that the company “precluded the exercise of voting by employees.”
The SLC told court that it did not commit any unlawful act and that it did not try to curtail the right to vote. “The work scale on the day of the election was due to the operational need generated by the beginning of soybean planting,” he said.
The same argument that “never violated the freedom of its workers” was given by the company Fomentas (MT) in a lawsuit in which he was ordered to pay an indemnity of $ 50,000.
In the process there is a photograph in which employees hold a track with the phrase: “Fomenties support Bolsonaro,” as well as Whatsapp messages where one of the teams said that he brought together employees and showed Lula videos “talking about abortion and defending bandits and drugs.”
The company told court that, at the aforementioned meeting, “there was no vote request.” Already the photograph was taken by “free and spontaneous will,” he said.
