The decision was made by a federal court in Brasília and allows the Ethics Committee of the Presidency of the Republic to resume an investigation that had begun in early 2021 and was halted that same year, during the government of Jair Bolsonaro.
The process was reactivated in January 2022, when Lula da Silva came to power, but Campos Neto obtained a precautionary decision that halted it again.
The argument at the time was that the Central Bank, by a law approved in 2021, has full administrative autonomy, therefore it could not be investigated by a federal government agency.
However, the ruling published today by the Federal Regional Court of Brasília maintains that the Ethics Committee of the Presidency has full powers to investigate possible conflicts of interest in state agencies, whether autonomous or not.
In statements to the G1 portal, the lawyers for the president of the Central Bank of Brazil indicate that this "is a case that has already been examined by public oversight bodies, including the Attorney General's Office, and that they did not find any irregularities, and the investigation was even shelved".
Campos Neto was proposed as president of the Central Bank by Bolsonaro and his term ends at the end of this year, when Lula da Silva will propose his successor, who will have to be approved by parliament.
Suspicions against Campos Neto arose with the so-called "Pandora Papers", an investigation by the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists (ICIJ), which revealed tax evasion operations by politicians, businesspeople and millionaires from dozens of countries.
Since then, Campos Neto has denied any irregularities in his business dealings and claims that all operations abroad were duly declared to the Brazilian tax authorities.
Since Lula da Silva came to power, he has been at odds with Campos Neto over the Central Bank's high interest rate policies, which, according to the head of state, are holding back growth.
The Central Bank claims that these policies, which keep rates above 10% per year with inflation at around 4%, are due to the need to control price increases in a scenario of domestic fiscal uncertainty and global economic turmoil.
