The wants to investigate new companies that may have acted in complicity with the dictatorship in Brazil. Currently, the MPF is investigating 13 companies suspected of having contributed to serious human rights violations.
According to the federal prosecutor, Marlon Alberto Weichert, who coordinates the Memory, Truth and Defense of Democracy working group of the Federal Attorney’s Office for Citizens’ Rights, the investigations are at different stages, but the expectation is to reach an agreement with some of these organizations soon.
“Some [procedimentos] already [estão] in a situation of dialogue with companies, to conclude some agreement, establish some understanding. Others, in the draft draft of public civil actions”stated the prosecutor.
Marlon does not anticipate the name of these institutions that could close an agreement with the MPF, as negotiations are still taking place. The expectation, however, is that these cases may reinforce the opening of new cases against more commercial groups that have collaborated with the dictatorship.
“Our objective is to have a 3rd wave, bigger than this 2nd wave. That, with the resources that come from convictions in public civil actions or from new agreements, we can continue to improve this model and expand this work, which I think is pioneering”, said the prosecutor.
2nd wave
The 2nd wave referred to by the promoter was an offshoot of the first TAC (Conduct Adjustment Term) of its kind, .
In the photo, the Beetle assembly line at the Volkswagen factory – National Archives/Disclosure
The agreement resulted in the payment of R$36.3 million by Volkswagen. Of this total, the majority, R$16.8 million, was allocated to compensation for former employees of the automaker who were fired, arrested or tortured.
Around 12%, R$4.5 million, financed research into the collaboration of commercial enterprises with the dictatorship, with the coordination of Unifesp (Federal University of São Paulo).
It was with these resources that Unifesp’s Caaf (Center for Anthropology and Forensic Archeology) prepared the largest study in the country of the relations between private capital and military oppression, and gathered documentary and testimonial evidence against the 13 corporations that are now under analysis by the MPF.
Violations during the dictatorship
Unifesp professor Edson Teles coordinated the research project at Caaf. According to him, they all participated in rights violations during the dictatorship.
Among the violations mapped are practices such as maintaining torture rooms within the establishments themselves, or attacks on original populations, traditional populations, such as quilombolas, or even complicity with the actions of repressive bodies.
The expert explains that the “complicity” came through the structuring of internal information and surveillance divisions. Those “departments” organized “dirty lists”which included the names of workers linked to unions or who simply fought for rights.
“It is not uncommon to have police officers or Armed Forces personnel working within these companies, in offices. And one of the regime’s stipulations is that the firms constantly produce files, lists, of the names of people who should be persecuted.”
According to Teles, these lists were circulated by other firms and also by the DOPS (Department of Political and Social Order), the regime’s repressive body. The purpose was to create an information network to prevent opponents of the regime from obtaining work and income.
For Paulo Abrão, jurist and former National Secretary of Justice, the method was subtle and perverse.
“[Tinha] a perverse subtlety that deconstructed people’s life plans. It took away the person’s economic condition. In a painful, long process of exclusion”.
That’s what happened to the family of now journalist Ivan Seixas. He was arrested with his father, Joaquim Seixas, when he was 16 years old. But before the arrest, the family had already been the target of this type of persecution.
“My father was a Petrobras employee, a public servant, and he was fired. Then he couldn’t find a job. We lived in Rio de Janeiro and he couldn’t find a job anywhere. We had to go to Porto Alegre to try to escape the repression and this dirty list that prohibited giving jobs to anyone who was an enemy of the dictatorship”said the journalist.
Ivan Seixas, teenager, arrested at 16, without trial – Memórias da Ditadura/Disclosure
According to Ivan, in addition to economic difficulties, the families of those persecuted faced social stigma, especially women.
“Women, when their husband was arrested and imprisoned, had no support. The husband worked and she didn’t. At the time it was like that. At the same time, there was the accusation that a relative was a terrorist, a dangerous communist. So the wife was embarrassed, the children were embarrassed and went hungry.”
Ivan’s father died 1 day after arrest, under torture, in front of his son. Even without being convicted, Ivan remained in prison until he was 22 years old.
For Edson Teles, Caaf research helps prove that the ideal of the military dictatorship, which had the Armed Forces at its head, was only sustained because it served business interests.
“It was a country project linked to a plan by capital, by large national and international corporations, on how to better dominate the territory for its economic benefits and to better extract its wealth and better exploit its workers.”
This text was originally published by Agência Brasil, on May 25, 2026. The content is free for republication, citing the source, and was adapted to the standard of Poder360.
