Logo of Brazilian company Odebrecht, renamed Novonor, in Rio de Janeiro on June 23, 2016 (AFP/YASUYOSHI CHIBA)
The Colombian public prosecutor’s office announced on Thursday the indictment of 55 people in connection with the Odebrecht scandal, including a group of 22 former officials and lobbyists of the Brazilian construction company, and 33 former state officials.
The prosecution has indicated on its website that it will file the charges for “appropriation of public property”. The former president of Odebrecht – today called Novonor -, Marcelo Odebrecht, is among the defendants.
“For at least eight years (2009-2016) the multinational Odebrecht (…) appropriated public property for its own benefit” and paid “80 billion pesos” (17.9 million euros) to officials who chose Odebrecht to build a 528 kilometer road between the center of the country and the Caribbean coast, detailed the prosecution.
Mr. Odebrecht was sentenced to a reduced 19-year prison term, which he is serving at home, for another bribery scandal involving the Brazilian oil company Petrobras.
The prosecution also indicated that it had issued an international arrest warrant against Eder Paolo Ferracuti, Amilton Hideaki and Marcio Marangonni, senior Brazilian officials from the Odebrecht company, already charged in March 2021 in connection with the scandal surrounding the construction group.
– “Reopen” the files –
These announcements come a day after the President of Colombia, Gustavo Petro, asked the public prosecutor’s office to “reopen” these files, requesting the help of Brazil and the United States to sanction the masterminds of this system of corruption.
He castigated the impunity from which the main perpetrators of this system would benefit.
At the end of 2020, the Superintendence of Industry and Commerce of Colombia imposed a 50 million dollar fine on Odebrecht, but the construction company “did not pay a peso”, according to Mr. Petro, quoted in a press release from the presidency.
The president claimed that the prosecutor’s office had “allowed” Odebrecht leaders to leave the country, so that they would not expose the politicians who received the bribes.
“We know who they bribed” and “who were the intermediaries. But we don’t know where the money went because it went to those who have political power”, launched Gustavo Petro.
Unlike other Latin American countries, Colombia has not tried any senior state official in this case.
Luis Fernando Andrade, former director of the National Infrastructure Agency (ANI), a public body, is however cited in the list of accused. This former official, the highest ranking on the list, fled to the United States in 2018, accusing the prosecution of persecution.
In Peru, three former presidents are under investigation and a fourth, Alan Garcia, committed suicide on April 17, 2019 when he was about to be arrested in connection with the same scandal.
The prosecution also assured that Odebrecht had contributed $800,000 to the campaign of ex-president Juan Manuel Santos (2010-2018), without him being part of the list of accused released Thursday.
Odebrecht was ordered to pay fines in several countries, including $2.6 billion to the governments of Brazil, the United States and Switzerland.
© 2023 AFP
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