Development: On 3 August José Dirceu, the former cabinet chief of Brazil’s former president Lula da Silva (2003-2010), was arrested, accused of being the mastermind behind the corruption scandal at state-owned oil company Petrobras. Significance: Dirceu’s arrest puts Lula, the ruling Partido dos Trabalhadores (PT) and, by extension, President Dilma Rousseff back in the firing line, ahead of nationwide protests called for 16 August. Dirceu was the mastermind of the ‘mensalão’ scheme, the cash-for-votes scandal that operated in 2003-2005 and badly damaged the Lula government. Already under house arrest in Brasília as he completes the final years of his sentence…