A robbery, spying on a babysitter and bids for power: the latest scandal to hit the government of Gustavo Petro

The Attorney General’s Office Colombia opened an investigation for allegedly illegal wiretapping of two domestic workers –among them, a nanny– of the president’s chief of staff Gustavo Petrowho, hours later, kicked out of the government the official and the ambassador to Venezuela, Armando Benedettitwo key figures of his management.

Yes ok Petro said in an act this Friday that “no one has been ordered a single wiretapping,” but anyway, “While it is investigated, my dear and esteemed official and the Venezuelan ambassador withdraw from the Government.”

LOOK: Camila Zuluaga, the journalist who wrote a letter to Petro stating that “a fanatical follower of his” released a video of his family

“Accusing the government of the change of illegal interceptions is of such irresponsibility. No member of the government has given any order for wiretaps.” I had written last night Petro on his Twitter account.

Accusing the government of the change of illegal interceptions is so irresponsible. No member of the government has issued any order for wiretaps.

Tomorrow we will rule on the decisions I have made around the polygraph case

— Gustavo Petro (@petrogustavo) June 2, 2023

Before, consulted on the subject, Petro had said “let them investigate all they want” and defended the use of polygraph tests, such as the one used on the nanny: “They have been done for years for the security of the presidency.”

This Friday morning, the Minister of the Interior, Luis Fernando Velasco, confirmed that the official presented her resignation letter as soon as the scandal broke out. Submit a letter of resignation does not mean acknowledging any kind of responsibility, but to assume a politically responsible attitude so that the President does not feel tied down if he has to make a decision”said.

The case

The head of the Prosecutor’s Office assured on Thursday at a press conference that The phone of the former babysitter of the officials was intercepted “with the use of a false report” in which they linked her to drug traffickers, after the theft of a briefcase with thousands of dollars in the house of Laura Sarabiathe chief of staff.

Another employee of the official was also listened to, both accused of working with the narco commander known as siopas in the department of collided (west), more than 550 km from their residences in the capital.

#ATTENTION | official communiqué of the #Prosecutor’s Office General of the Nation. pic.twitter.com/sqrXtmJKtB

– Colombian Prosecutor’s Office (@FiscaliaCol) June 2, 2023

to the babysitter Marelbys Meza They also subjected her to a interrogation with polygraph on January 30 in a building attached to the presidential headquarters that is being investigated by authorities.

“This case is not only aberrational from the judicial point of view, it is a case that puts us once again in the worst historical scenario of Colombia what is the human rights violation”, stated the attorney general, Francisco Barbosa.

According to the Prosecutor’s Office, the police created two false profiles of the women, linking them to the narco group gulf clanas a pretext for a local judge to authorize the interceptions of his telephone calls, after a suitcase with money disappeared from the house of Laura Sarabia, the chief of staff. All behind the back of the Prosecutor’s Office, according to the Public Ministry.

“They turn them into members of the Clan del Golfo, they listen to them and later in the afternoon as if we were with the Gestapo in Colombia, they transfer her in a car, they do a polygraph that has nothing to do with national security”, Barbosa recounted.

#Release l The National Government informs public opinion of the following: pic.twitter.com/2rEKFZZNDv

– Colombian Presidency ???????? (@infopresidencia) May 27, 2023

He gulf clan It is the largest drug gang in Colombiaformed from the remnants of the far-right paramilitaries that operated with the help of some members of the security forces.

“Today is a very unfortunate day for the rule of law in Colombia. Today we can clearly say that the chuzadas, the illegal interceptions, have returned to Colombia”, said the prosecutor.

He also informed that in the next few days charges will be called against several involved in these illegal actions, without specifying who they might be. He explained that three lines of investigation have been opened: one for the theft of the suitcase, another for the irregular practice of polygraph tests and another for illegal wiretapping.

The case has become controversial in Colombia and for the Petro government, which championed “change” and promised to put an end to illegal wiretapping practices that took place in the Álvaro Uribe government.

A few days ago, prosecutor Barbosa had already warned that the entity he directs is the only one that has the power to investigate criminal proceedings. Colombian law also establishes that intelligence agencies can only intercept phones with the authorization of a judge.

From robbery to wiretapping

According to his complaint, illegal wiretapping was carried out on two collaborators of Sarabia after what The chief of staff reported on January 29 the loss of a briefcase with $7,000 in cash from inside her home. What the Prosecutor’s Office is now investigating is whether the official, who is a person fully trusted by the president with the ability to influence his decisions, abused her position and used the state intelligence apparatus to clarify the disappearance of the money.

When Sarabia He filed a complaint about the theft of the suitcase with the Prosecutor’s Office, he did not indicate that his collaborators could be suspected. According to the Prosecutor’s Office, on January 30, that is, one day after the robbery, police intelligence agents began the illegal wiretapping of the two women.

The prosecutor’s revelations were preceded by the expectation that exists in the country for the decisions that the government of Gustavo Petro in the last few hours, not only in front of his chief of staff, but also around the Colombian ambassador in Venezuela, Armando Benedetti, who today has some marked differences with the official, despite the fact that they were close in the past.

Benedetti suggests that the senior official is behind the illegal wiretapping since she herself told him that the nanny had the intention of reporting to the media that she felt persecuted. According to the ambassador, Sarabia he had no way of knowing the woman’s plans except by wiretapping.

the same Benedetti contradicted Sarabia as to the amount of money missing, indicating that it is an amount much greater than $7,000. It would be, according to his version, 150 million pesos, about $34,000. According to the chief of staff, they corresponded to about per diems for different government trips.

The babysitter’s testimony

Last weekend, Marelbyus Meza gave an interview to the Colombian magazine Semana, in which she revealed details of some polygraph tests that were performed on her after the disappearance of the suitcase and commented that since then she felt persecuted.

“When I was in the basement I felt kidnapped, dazed, drowning, waiting for the polygraph to be done. They told me that if I didn’t cooperate they were going to put me in jail (imprison) and that they were going to go after my family,” Meza declared.

Meza was the caretaker of the children of Benedetti in June 2022, but she was fired for theft after a polygraph test that detected lies in her explanation, according to the ambassador.

My family and I were victims of a robbery. The Prosecutor’s Office investigates who gave the version to Semana as responsible. The presidential protection headquarters and the Sijin acted by applying the protocols within the framework of the law. pic.twitter.com/sUTo923Evb

— Laura Sarabia (@laurisarabia) May 27, 2023

Benedetti was Sarabia’s boss in the past and introduced her to Petro before he hired her as chief of staff, in a power triangle that is cracking.

The reason why Meza ends up working for Sarabia despite the robbery at his former boss’s house has not been clarified.

According to press reports, Sarabia accuses Benedetti of setting him up and blackmail her by not publishing the babysitter’s interview in exchange for a ministry.

The ambassador, who took Meza on a private flight to Caracas where the nanny stayed for several days, says that he was trying to help Sarabia and it is she who “is manipulating the information and that smoke screen that does not justify the abuse of power, kidnapping and intimidation”, according to a message on his Twitter account.

Is @laurisarabia the one who hires Marelbys as her babysitter without mediation or interference from me. She even asked my permission to hire her.

— Armando Benedetti (@AABenedetti) May 31, 2023

The opening of investigations by the Attorney General’s Office occurs in the middle of a Institutional clash between President Gustavo Petro and prosecutor Francisco Barbosa. In a recent statement, the head of the Public Ministry said that President Petro’s peace policy had become an incentive for crime. He also accused him of having violated the rule of law by saying that the President of the Republic was the head of the Prosecutor.

Petro, for his part, has also criticized Barbosa for allegedly having put under the table investigations for “hundreds” of murders by paramilitaries on the Colombian Caribbean coast.

Agencies AP and AFP

Source: Elcomercio

jack

I am Jack Morton and I work in 24 News Recorder. I mostly cover world news and I have also authored 24 news recorder. I find this work highly interesting and it allows me to keep up with current events happening around the world.