Danilo Macedo          Reporter Agência Brasil

Brasília – Wagner Rossi, the minister of Agriculture, sent a letter of resignation to president Dilma Rousseff last night. Rossi wrote that the decision to leave was due to pressure from his family.

“Over the last 30 days I have faced an onslaught of false and unproven accusations. The truth is that absolutely nothing I have done in the public service could ever be considered illegal or improper,” said Rossi, adding that he intended to answer each and every accusation with documentary evidence that he claimed the media ignored as it leveled charges of corruption and influence traffic against him.

According to the weekly newsmagazine, Veja, a ministry subsidiary, the National Supply Corporation (“Conab”), had become a center of irregular activities with public monies. Then the daily newspaper Correio Braziliense reported that Rossi traveled on a jet belonging to a farm sector company with ministry of Agriculture contracts (the firm sells products (insecticides, for example) that require authorization by the ministry).

Rossi is the fourth minister to resign in the last two months (the first was Antonio Palocci at the beginning of June). And he is the third minister, along with Palocci, formerly Chief of Staff, and Alfredo Nascimento, formerly of Transportation, to resign under a cloud of corruption accusations. The fourth resigning minister was Nelson Jobim of Defense. However, Rossi, unlike Palocci and Nascimento (and Jobim, for that matter), was an important man in an important political party (the PMDB) that provides political backing in the Congress for the government.

Allen Bennett – translator/editor The News in English – content modified

Link - Ministro da Agricultura pede demissão, mas nega envolvimento em irregularidades