Would appear that the arrest is largely about SMM agent Guilherme Esteves de Jesus(GEJ) allegedly bribing Martin Cheah of SMM' s EJA Brazil.   

 

If true, this must have been so that GEJ could be retained as SMM' s agent in Brazil.

 

If this is correct, it is not related to accusations that SMM was bribing Petrobras/SeteBrasil like KeppelCorp took its big fall for.

 

SMM has a clean reputation in this business, and if GEJ did bribe/kickback to Martin, it is just corruption between two individuals, and irrelevant to the main concern, which is whether SMM bribed Petrobras/Sete like Keppel.

 

For 4 years, the Brazil authorities could not get GEJ, because they had no evidence, despite claims otherwise. GEJ even applied to the court to throw out the charges(that he had bribed Petrobras/Sete) based on lack of evidence. The court did not allow. Former Judge Sergio Moro, who started this case, is now under huge pressure to resign after his emails showing him conspiring with prosecutors to frame his other targets were leaked to the media.

 

Even if GEJ did bribe Petrobras, SMM would not be implicated since it did not instruct him to bribe or supply money for that purpose.

 

The present new developments do not change this scenario.