The Petrobras Eligibility Committee reported today that the meeting that will assess whether or not communicator Caio Mário Paes de Andrade can become president of the state-owned company will be held on Friday (24). The statement came after the company received the necessary dossiers this afternoon to analyze his candidacy, who was nominated by the government of President Jair Bolsonaro (PL). The Ministry of Mines and Energy confirmed Caio’s name earlier this month.
The process has been considered slow by the federal government, which is in a hurry to change the company’s command amid a crisis with the state’s top management, caused by the increase in fuel prices announced on Friday (17), when the company readjusted the value of gasoline by 5.2% and that of diesel by 14.2%.
The change in command of Petrobras was decided at the end of May. Andrade is the current special secretary Debureaucratization, Management and Digital Government, linked to the Ministry of Economy of Paulo Guedes, and responsible for the government platform (gov.br). He is also a member of the boards of directors of Embrapa (Empresa Brasileira de Pesquisa Agropecuária).
This is the third change in the leadership of Petrobras during the government of President Jair Bolsonaro (PL). The company was also chaired by Roberto Castello Branco and General Joaquim Silva e Luna.
No industry experience
According to his LinkedIn profile, Caio Mario Paes de Andrade holds a degree in Social Communication from Unip (Universidade Paulista) and a postgraduate degree in Administration and Management from Harvard University (1992-1993), in the United States. He also holds a Masters in Business Administration from Duke University (1997-1998), also in the USA.
The secretary is the founder and advisor of the Fazer Acabar Institute and, in 2019, he left the private sector and moved to the public sector. He also served as president of Serpro (Federal Service for Data Processing), a public information technology company, until August 2020, when he left to assume his current role.
Andrade is still close to Senator Flávio Bolsonaro (PL-RJ), the president’s eldest son, and has a positive evaluation in the government for the implementation of the gov.br platform. However, he has no oil and gas experience, and governance rules require 10 years of experience in the sector.
In April, Guedes defended the choice of a name for the state-owned company that works to unbundle the productive chain of the fuel market in the country and privatize the company.
