Antônio Pedro de Siqueira Indio da Costa (born October 20, 1970), also known as Índio da Costa, is a Brazilian

lawyer A lawyer is a person who practices law. The role of a lawyer varies greatly across different legal jurisdictions. A lawyer can be classified as an advocate, attorney, barrister, canon lawyer, civil law notary, counsel, counselor, solic ...

and

politician A politician is a person active in party politics, or a person holding or seeking an elected office in government. Politicians propose, support, reject and create laws that govern the land and by an extension of its people. Broadly speaking, a ...

. On June 30, 2010, it was announced that da Costa had been chosen as the vice presidential running mate by leading presidential candidate

José Serra José Serra Chirico (; born 19 March 1942) is a Brazilian politician who has served as a Congressman, Senator, Minister of Planning, Minister of Health, Mayor of São Paulo, Governor of São Paulo state, and Minister of Foreign Affairs of Braz ...

of the PSDB party.

Background

Indio da Costa holds a law degree from the

Universidade Candido Mendes Universidade Candido Mendes is a private university located in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. It is Latin America's oldest private university. History It was founded in 1902, thus being the oldest private university in Latin America, by the Count Când ...

and has a Master's degree from the

Universidade Federal do Rio de Janeiro The Federal University of Rio de Janeiro or University of Brazil (UFRJ; pt, Universidade Federal do Rio de Janeiro or ') is a public research university located in the state of Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. It is the largest federal university in the ...

. Divorced, he has one daughter. Da Costa's cousin,

Luís Octavio Indio da Costa Luis is a given name. It is the Spanish form of the originally Germanic name or . Other Iberian Romance languages have comparable forms: (with an accent mark on the i) in Portuguese and Galician, in Aragonese and Catalan, while is archaic ...

, is a banker himself, owning the Banco Cruzeiro do Sul. Da Costa's father and brother are known as architects and designers.

Political Life

Indio da Costa entered politics in 1996 as part of the center-right PFL. He later joined the administration of Rio de Janeiro mayor

Cesar Maia Cesar Epitácio Maia (born June 18, 1945) is a Brazilian politician, notable for having been elected three times for mayor of Rio de Janeiro. A native of Rio, born in 1945, Maia was forced to leave Brazil in exile during the 1960s on account of ...

, busying himself with managing the

Aterro do Flamengo Flamengo Park, also known as ''Aterro do Flamengo'', Eduardo Gomes Park, and Aterro do Brigadeiro Eduardo Gomes, is the largest public park and recreation area within the city of Rio de Janeiro, in eastern Brazil, and the largest urban park by ...

gardens first and later as Secretary of Administration (i.e. as comptroller for all matters regarding personnel and public purchases) . Da Costa was elected to the Rio de Janeiro City Council in 1997, where he stayed for three terms, until 2007. As councilman, he was investigated by an inquiry commission of the same council for suspects of overpriced contracting of

catering Catering is the business of providing food service at a remote site or a site such as a hotel, hospital, pub, aircraft, cruise ship, park, festival, filming location or film studio. History of catering The earliest account of major services be ...

services for Rio's public schools during his earlier spell as secretary, such charges being eventually dismissed. While at the city council, he presented a polemical bill that proposed to forbid

almsgiving Alms (, ) are money, food, or other material goods donated to people living in poverty. Providing alms is often considered an act of virtue or charity. The act of providing alms is called almsgiving, and it is a widespread practice in a number ...

in the city of Rio de Janeiro, subjecting it to a fine - a bill that was rejected out of hand by the city council as unconstitutional. Between 1999 and 2001, Da Costa was affiliated with the center-left PTB Party. In 2001, he returned to the PFL, which had rebranded itself as the Democrat Party ( Democrats or DEM, as it is known today.) In 2000, Da Costa spent several weeks in

New York City New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the List of United States cities by population, most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the L ...

working inside a major election operation in the United States to get acquainted with tactics and technology used in the mayoral campaign of

Michael R. Bloomberg Michael Rubens Bloomberg (born February 14, 1942) is an American businessman, politician, philanthropist, and author. He is the majority owner, co-founder and CEO of Bloomberg L.P. He was Mayor of New York City from 2002 to 2013, and was a ca ...

. Da Costa worked alongside

Arick Wierson Arick Wierson (born November 23, 1971) is an American columnist who writes on politics and business for CNN. He is also a regular contributor to several other major US publications including Vice (magazine), ''Vice'', ''The New York Observer'', ...

who was heading Bloomberg's field operations. Da Costa later announced that he had earlier implemented many of the Bloomberg's management tactics while he was Secretary for Administration in the Maia mayoralty. In 2006, Da Costa was elected as a Brazilian Federal Deputy (Congressman) and on June 30, 2010, was chosen as the running mate to presidential candidate

. - in what was seem as a move pressed on Serra by the DEM leadership, as Serra tended to favour a "pure-blooded" PSDB ticket As vice-presidential candidate, he made himself noticed mostly by his declarations accusing the Workers' Party of connections with the

FARC The Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia – People's Army ( es, link=no, Fuerzas Armadas Revolucionarias de ColombiaEjército del Pueblo, FARC–EP or FARC) is a Marxist–Leninist guerrilla group involved in the continuing Colombian conflic ...

and international drug dealing, something that earned him the nickname of "Serra s

Palin The surname Palin is a name of British origin, either English or Welsh. Possible derivations include an anglicization of the Welsh patronymic ''ap Heilyn'' ("son of Heilyn") or a reference to the English placenames Poling, West Sussex or Sea Pallin ...

". After the results of the 2010 election, which by the popular vote elected

Dilma Rousseff Dilma Vana Rousseff (; born 14 December 1947) is a Brazilian economist and politician who served as the 36th president of Brazil, holding the position from 2011 until her impeachment and removal from office on 31 August 2016. She is the first w ...

as Brazil's first female president, Indio da Costa parted from his former political party "DEM" to become one of the founders of the PSD "Social Democrats Party" along with the then Mayor of São Paulo,

Gilberto Kassab Gilberto Kassab ( or ; born 12 August 1960) is a Brazilian politician and former mayor of São Paulo. His term ended in 2012. A civil engineer and economist, one of the most famous Brazilians of Syrian descent, Kassab took over from José Serra, ...

Notes

{{DEFAULTSORT:Indio Da Costa, Antonio Pedro De Siqueira 1970 births Living people People from Rio de Janeiro (city) Liberal Front Party (Brazil) politicians Brazilian Labour Party (current) politicians Democrats (Brazil) politicians Social Democratic Party (Brazil, 2011) politicians Members of the Chamber of Deputies (Brazil) from Rio de Janeiro (state) Federal University of Rio de Janeiro alumni Universidade Candido Mendes alumni Candidates for Vice President of Brazil