Maria das Graças Foster is no average Brazilian executive. For a start, the chief executive of Petrobras is a woman — in fact, the first woman to lead an oil major. Nor was she born into a life of privilege but raised in one of Rio de Janeiro’s most dangerous slums. After collecting scrap metal for cash as a child, she joined Petrobras as an intern in 1978 and accumulated an encyclopedic knowledge of Brazil’s state-controlled oil producer that would put any boss to shame.
玛丽亚•格拉卡斯•福斯特(Maria das Graças Foster)并非等闲的巴西企业高管。首先，这位巴西国家石油公司(Petrobras)的前首席执行官是位女性——事实上，也是执掌大型石油企业的首位女性。她也没有显赫出身，相反她是在里约热内卢最危险的贫民窟之一长大。小时候曾捡废金属卖钱的她，于1978年以实习生的身份进入巴西国家石油公司，逐渐对这家国有石油生产商了如指掌，足以让任何一个老板自惭形愧。
It is a remarkable career path but one that looks likely to end in a sadly familiar way by Latin American standards: with a corruption scandal. Over the past few months, Petrobras has become engulfed in the largest bribery and kickback investigation in Brazil’s history. Prosecutors believe that for much of the past decade, Petrobras executives conspired with Brazil’s largest construction firms to inflate the oil company’s contracts, stealing billions of dollars to fund lavish lifestyles, pay bribes and funnel money to politicians, largely from the ruling Workers’ party.
这是一条不同寻常的职业道路，但似乎也是一条很可能以拉丁美洲惯有的悲惨结局告终的道路：以腐败丑闻的方式。在过去几个月中，巴西国家石油公司卷入了该国史上最大的受贿与回扣案。检察官相信，在过去十年大部分时间内，巴西国家石油公司高层与巴西最大的几家工程建设公司合谋虚报该公司合同价格，从中牟取数十亿美元用以享受奢侈生活、行贿以及向政客输送资金，而受贿官员多出自执政的劳工党(Workers'Party)。While Ms Graças Foster has not been accused of involvement in the scheme, the straight-talking 61-year-old has repeatedly offered her resignation to President Dilma Rousseff. “The president thought I should stay,” she told reporters bluntly in December. The reality, analysts say, is that no sane executive would be willing to take over the company in its current uncertain state.
尽管格拉卡斯•福斯特并未被指卷入这一丑闻，但这位说话坦率的61岁女掌门多次向巴西总统迪尔玛•罗塞夫(Dilma Rousseff)提出了辞职。“总统认为我应该留下来，”去年12月她对记者坦言。分析师称，实际情况是没有哪个明智的高管会愿意接手这家目前看来前景不明的公司。
As well as facing a Securities and Exchange Commission investigation in the US, Petrobras remains cut off from capital markets and risks technical default after its auditors PwC refused to approve its accounts in November. “Any potential candidate to replace Ms Graças Foster would be wary of coming on before the current executives sign off the damage,” says João Augusto de Castro Neves of Eurasia Group, a political risk consultancy.
除了要面对美国证券交易委员会(SEC)的调查，由于去年11月其审计机构普华永道会计事务所(PwC)拒绝核实该公司的账目，巴西国家石油公司仍然被挡在资本市场之外并面临技术性违约的风险。“任何可能接替格拉卡斯•福斯特的人选都会心存警惕，不愿在现任高管结束这个烂摊子前接手，”政治风险咨询机构欧亚集团(Eurasia Group)的若昂•奥古斯托•德卡斯特罗•内维斯(João Augusto de Castro Neves)称。The scandal — dubbed “Car Wash” as petrol stations were allegedly used to launder some of the money — is not only a sorry turn of events for Ms Graças Foster but also for Petrobras and Brazil itself. After winning respect for its technological prowess and becoming the envy of the global industry in 2007 by making the largest offshore oil discoveries in decades, Petrobras may soon have to resort to a government bailout. Similarly, after wowing investors with 7.5 per cent growth in 2010, Brazil once again finds itself an object of ridicule in international markets as the corruption scandal threatens to deepen an expected recession this year. As former president Fernando Henrique Cardoso wrote in his memoirs, “hope followed by disappointment is a particularly Brazilian cycle”.
因加油站被指用于部分洗钱活动而被称为“洗车”(Car Wash)的丑闻，不论对格拉卡斯•福斯特个人，还是对巴西国家石油公司甚至巴西来说都是一个可悲的转折点。由于发现了几处数十年来最大的海上油田，2007年巴西国家石油公司在技术实力上赢得尊重，并且成为全球石油业令人羡慕的对象。然而，如今该公司可能很快将不得不求助于政府援助。同样，2010年巴西以7.5%的增长率令投资者惊艳，但今年因腐败丑闻可能加深预期中的衰退程度，巴西发现自己再次成了国际市场嘲笑的对象。巴西前总统费尔南多•恩里克•卡多佐(Fernando Henrique Cardoso)在其回忆录中写道：“希望之后是失望，这是典型的巴西式循环。”Ms Graças Foster, a towering and somewhat gaunt figure, never appeared to harbour any illusions about the challenges that lay ahead when she became chief executive in February 2012.
格拉卡斯•福斯特是高个子，略显瘦削，2012年2月出任首席执行官，当时她对即将面临的挑战似乎不抱任何幻想。When asked in an FT interview that year about her ascension up the Petrobras ranks, she replied: “Power doesn’t come by itself, it comes with responsibility and it’s the responsibility I live with, which weighs on me, which wakes me up at two o’clock in the morning, takes me away from my friends, and makes me a more impatient and irritable person”. Despite having the vestiges of a personal life — a husband, two children, a granddaughter, and a love of cats and cooking — she has been quoted as saying she would “die” for the company that transformed her life.
那年，在接受英国《金融时报》采访时被问及升职一事，格拉卡斯•福斯特回答称：“权力不会独自到来，而是伴随着责任，那就是我要接受的责任，它压在我身上，让我到凌晨2点醒来，让我远离朋友，让我成为一个更易怒而急躁的人。”尽管她尚拥有一部分私人生活——丈夫、两个孩子、一个孙女，爱猫，爱烹饪——但据称她曾说过愿意为了这家改变她一生的公司而“死”的话。New York and São Paulo quoted Petrobras itself was already in trouble when she took charge. Covert fuel subsidies to help the government battle inflation were costing the company billions of dollars and there was little Ms Graças Foster could do to change a practice that enraged private minority investors. She and Ms Rousseff had been close friends since the president’s days as an energy official in the 1990s.
在纽约和圣保罗两地上市的巴西国家石油公司在格拉卡斯•福斯特接管时就已经陷入困境。帮助政府抵御通胀而提供的隐蔽的燃料补贴，耗费了该公司数十亿美元的资金，这一做法激怒了私人投资者，但格拉卡斯•福斯特对此无计可施。自20世纪90年代罗塞夫担任能源官员起，她们便一直是亲密的朋友。Some say the weight on Ms Graças Foster’s shoulders was, in fact, the knowledge of a vast corruption scandal that had yet to come to light. Venina Velosa da Fonseca, a former Petrobras manager, said during a tearful television interview last month that she had warned several directors of inflated contracts in 2008, including Ms Graças Foster who was head of the gas and energy division at the time. Ms Graças Foster has vehemently denied she was aware of the scheme and Petrobras said it has been taking all necessary measures to investigate alleged irregularities.
有人说，格拉卡斯•福斯特肩上的压力，实际上是她知道公司内存在一个尚未曝光的巨大腐败丑闻。巴西国家石油公司前经理韦尼娜•韦洛萨达方茜卡(Venina Velosa da Fonseca)在不久前的电视采访中含泪称，她曾在2008年就虚报合同价格问题提醒过数位高管，其中包括当时主管天然气和能源部门的格拉卡斯•福斯特。格拉卡斯•福斯特极力否认她事先知情，巴西国家石油公司则表示一直在采取所有必要措施对涉嫌违规行为进行调查。Whistleblower tales, along with rumours of death threats and money hidden in buried swimming pools have gripped Brazilians like a sordid soap opera, prompting both despair and fascination. But in two weeks’ time, many will finally get the chance to vent their frustration over the scandal in a typically Brazilian way — by dressing up for Carnival. Masks modelled on Ms Graças Foster’s face are expected to sell out.
举报人讲的故事，再加上死亡威胁的传言和藏在被填埋的游泳池内的现金，就像一部鄙俗的肥皂剧一样，紧紧抓住了巴西人的眼球，让人们既心寒又好奇。但不久后，很多人将有机会用典型的巴西方式发泄对丑闻的愤怒——在嘉年华(Carnival)上乔装打扮。仿照格拉卡斯•福斯特样貌的面具预计将会热销。Her no-nonsense management style has won her the nickname “the tank”, but Ms Graças Foster also knows how to have fun — a big rock fan, she once admitted to having tattoos in “places you can’t see with clothes on”, according to state-owned broadcaster EBC.
格拉卡斯•福斯特说一不二的管理风格为自己赢得了“坦克”的绰号，但她也知道如何享受生活乐趣——她是个铁杆的摇滚迷。据巴西国有广播公司EBC报道，她曾承认自己在“衣服底下、你看不到的地方”有纹身。Yet, she is unlikely to see the funny side this Carnival. More than most, Ms Graças Foster understands the struggles of Brazil’s less fortunate and that their capacity to accept perennial disappointment has limits. Protesters have taken to the streets to demand Ms Rousseff’s impeachment over the scandal — a proposition that is gaining some sympathy in the country’s increasingly dissatisfied Congress. Ms Rousseff, who was chair of Petrobras when much of the graft supposedly took place, has denied any involvement in the alleged scheme.
不过，她不太可能会看到嘉年华有趣的一面了。格拉卡斯•福斯特无比了解巴西穷人的艰辛，也知道他们接受再三失望的能力是有极限的。抗议者走上街头，要求就丑闻一事弹劾罗塞夫——这一提议在日益不满的巴西议会也获得一些支持。据称巴西国家石油公司内部的部分贪腐行为发生在罗塞夫担任该公司董事会主席期间。罗塞夫否认与贿赂丑闻有任何牵连。If the protesters get their way, Brazil’s two first ladies may soon both be out of a job.
如果抗议者如愿以偿，那么巴西两位第一夫人可能都要失业了。