Since then, to date, he has received a total of G. 10,702 million (US$ 1.5 million). This results in around G. 200 million on average per month.
The current director of said financial entity, was Minister of Finance, and is also a former member of the board of directors of the Central Bank of Paraguay (BCP), and a former candidate for the presidency for the “Honor Colorado” movement in the 2017 electoral campaign, where he lost the internal of the Colorado Party with Mario Abdo Benítez, current president of the Republic. He is currently a presidential candidate again in the current election campaign.
Santiago Peña Palacios is also linked to the Puente brokerage firm, where his father is an influential manager, and to the Asunción Stock Exchange, where his father and brother work as trustees, another member being Eduardo Campos Marín, director of BASA affected by the operation against Darío Messer.
Eric Galeano
In addition to Peña, the Seprelad report also mentions other political actors linked to Cartes.
On March 12, 2021, Erico Galeano, deputy belonging to the “Honor Colorado” movement and former Chartism candidate for the governorship of the Central Department for the 2023 Elections, transferred US$ 2.2 million (G. 15,525 million) to a personal account of Horacio Cards.
Within the framework of the “AUltranzaPY” operation, a property was identified in the city of Altos, in the exclusive “Aqua Village” condominium, which ended up in the hands of a criminal organization, but which Galeano initially bought in February 2013, paying US$210. one thousand.
In 2020, deputy Galeano would have sold the property to Hugo González Ramos, who today appears as an important arm of the criminal organization that sent cocaine to Europe and Africa, according to the aforementioned operation.
For this reason, today he is accused; through a dubious sale transaction where the sale value was US$1 million and the buyer delivered a large part of the alleged payment in cash; without the operation having been formalized by public deed translating the domain right, a situation that is also striking considering the importance of the transaction; since for Paraguayan civil law, the contract is perfected only if it is implemented through a public deed.
SERGIO GODOY
Another politician linked to the former president is Sergio Godoy, current senator for “Honor Colorado”. According to the Seprelad report, Cartes made a loan of G. 10,828 million in 2014, amounting to Gs 25,468 million in 2018, without term, to the company Campos e Invernada SA
What is striking is that the national senator, Godoy, registers in his affidavits of Assets, having shares in the firm Campos e Invernada SA, in 2018 for a value of G. 22,000 million, and in 2020 for a value of Gs. 27,000 million, that is, amounts similar to those registered by Cartes in its accounts receivable.
“BACHI” NÚÑEZ
Finally, the report reveals a series of transfers from Cartes to Luis Rafael de los Ríos Velázquez, who was a confidant and general secretary of Basilio “Bachi” Núñez during his tenure in the Municipality of Villa Hayes from 2010 to 2015.
Basilio Núñez is leader of the caucus of the political movement of former President Cartes in the Chamber of Deputies; internal movement of the Colorado Party called “Honor Colorado”.
The transfers made by Cartes to Luis Rafael de los Ríos Velázquez, deputy Basilio Núñez’s right-hand man, total a sum close to US$1 million. These transfers took place between September 2020 and May 2021.
