Santa Casa: former provider responsible for internationalization guarantees knowledge of the money circuit

The responsibility for internationalization fell to the former provider, who appointed three managers for the Brazilian business. One of them resigned from the companies shortly after Ana Jorge took office, the other two continued in office, but with limited powers. In an exclusive interview, they say they knew about the audit and question the fact that the administration did not ask them for clarification before making this decision.

Edmundo Martinho’s management was questioned as soon as Ana Jorge reached the position of provider of the Santa Casa da Misericórdia in Lisbon. Given the expenditure on expanding games to Brazil and the way the business was proceeding, he expressed concern with the Ministry of Labor and Social Security.

At the time, the minister Ana Mendes Godinho decided to move forward with an auditwithout listening to the main person responsible for taking the games out of the country, the old provider.

“Someone might think it’s normal that I’m leaving at the end of April, they move forward with the process. They didn’t even tell me they were going to do the audit. No. Nothing. Nothing. Nothing. Zero. Zero contact. This is not normal”, says Edmundo Martinho, former provider of the Santa Casa da Misericórdia in Lisbon.

Edmundo Martinho ended up being called by the auditors, but says he was not asked questions about illegal acts or irregularities in investigating accounts and business procedures.

“I was heard by the auditing company, which did not ask me any questions about this, did not ask me any questions about any doubts they might have. Never, as I say, were they questioned in this regard. And what there is, is from the beginning, apparently , a conclusion of the audit that was reached even before the audit began”, adds the former person in charge.

One of the managers in Brazil assured SIC that they had not been questioned about possible crimes or irregularities. This is despite the fact that the Santa Casa administration sent the case to the Public Ministry and compulsorily dismissed him, at the same time as Ricardo Gonçalves, another of those responsible for the company in Brazil. He says that due to the deterioration of the situation, he was on leave when he was first called by BDO auditors. And when they contacted him for the second time he ended up not going.

“They want to ask me a question after having removed me based supposedly on a preliminary report that was found by BDO. Therefore, obviously, what I responded to BDO was that I was not going to respond to a pseudo inquiry, especially because From what I know happened, people were heard, but no one signed minutes of statements, they were simply heard”, says Ricardo Gonçalves, former manager of Santa Casa do Brasil, exclusively to SIC.

One of the criticisms of those responsible for the gaming business in Brazil towards Ana Jorge’s administration is the fact that there was a participation to justice before a final conclusion of the audit.

“(…) even before starting the audit process, if you remember, the ombudsman and the minister had the opportunity to publicly say and speak publicly about irregularities, without ever revealing what they were”, states Edmundo Martinho.

When asked if he is in a position to say what thecircuit of the money that left Santa CasaEdmundo Martinho responds affirmatively.

“All of this is more than documented. Everything”, he guarantees.

The final audit report, which has been successively postponed, will have been delivered by the company after dismissal with immediate effect from the administration of provider Ana Jorge, which put an end to the games’ internationalization business.