São Paulo’s Secretary of Public Security, Osvaldo Nico Gonçalves, said on Wednesday that the episode in which gubernatorial candidate Fernando Haddad (PT) claimed his driver was tailed by a military police vehicle after leaving him home on Tuesday night has been clarified as a misunderstanding.
According to Gonçalves, he exchanged messages with Haddad and also spoke with him by phone. An investigation showed that the police unit in question was responding to a separate occurrence: the arrest of four suspects accused of committing vehicle thefts using the "quebra‑vidro" (glass‑breaking) method on Avenida Nove de Julho. The officers did not know the vehicle they were monitoring had just transported Haddad.
Once the police verified that the car contained only the driver, they discontinued the approach and resumed their original operation. The incident was logged at the 27th Police District in Campo Belo.
Haddad had initially told journalists that his driver was followed by a police cruiser after being dropped off at his residence. The Secretariat of Public Security had said it would identify the units in the area and investigate the claim.
Gonçalves concluded, "The case is resolved. It was a misunderstanding."
The episode occurs amid the heated race for the São Paulo state government, where Haddad is the Workers’ Party (PT) candidate seeking to unseat the incumbent governor.