MORE recordings have emerged of Brazilian coup regime figures plotting to hush up a huge corruption scandal.

Two senior members of interim President Michel Temer’s Brazilian Democratic Movement Party (PMDB) were caught on tape discussing how to stymie probes into the multimillion-pound bribery scandal at state oil firm Petrobras.

The transcripts were published in newspaper Folha de Sao Paulo on Wednesday, less than two weeks after vice-president Mr Temer took power following the right-wing impeachment of his erstwhile ally Dilma Rousseff.

In the first recording, Senate Speaker Renan Calheiros is heard in conversation with ex-senator Sergio Machado, former head of another state oil company Transpetro, proposing legal changes to bar the use of plea bargain testimony.

Prosecutors have used such deals to implicate high-ranking businessmen and politicians, including Mr Calheiros.

In the second, former president Jose Sarney is heard promising Mr Machado that he would work to keep the investigation of the former senator out of the hands of lower court judge Sergio Moro, who is leading the probe.

Mr Sarney also says “certain conditions” were negotiated with the opposition to oust Ms Rousseff in what her party calls a legislative coup.

PMDB Chamber of Deputies Speaker Eduardo Cunha, who led the impeachment drive against Ms Rousseff, has been accused of taking millions of pounds worth of bribes in the Petrobras affair.

Meanwhile Ms Rousseff said Mr Temer’s aim was to privatise Brazil’s lucrative Atlantic coast pre-salt layer of oil and gas reserves to benefit “a few economic groups.”

The Petrobras website says those strata currently produce around 800,000 barrels of crude a day — around 20 per cent of the firm’s production, a figure set to rise to 52 per cent in 2018.

Mr Temer has announced cuts to education, health and other government budgets this week as part of an austerity drive.

Also on Wednesday Secretary of Investment Moreira Franco, the minister tasked with a raft of privatisations, announced government plans to lift current limits on foreign ownership of agricultural land.