The Peruvian Congress has admitted on Wednesday the constitutional complaint filed by the Attorney General’s Office against the Peruvian President, Pedro Castillo, accusing him of being the head of a criminal organization established within the Government.
With 13 votes in favor, eight against and no abstentions, the Subcommittee of Constitutional Accusations (SAC) of the Peruvian Parliament – chaired by the former president of Congress Lady Camones – has approved the report of qualification of the constitutional complaint filed by the Attorney General, Patricia Benavides, against the Peruvian president, reported ‘La Republica’.
Now, the constitutional complaint will have to follow its course in the Permanent Commission of the Congress in order to, if it reaches the sufficient votes, reach the plenary of the Parliament.
According to the Prosecutor’s Office, Castillo would be the head of a criminal organization active in the Ministry of Transport and Communications in complicity with Juan Silva, former Minister of this portfolio, with the former Minister of Housing Geiner Alvarado, as well as with officials of Provías Nacional and Provías Descentralizado, of the Presidential Office and of businessmen and third parties, to favor the Tarata III Bridge consortium and other companies in public bidding processes.
The President, for his part, has rejected all accusations against him and has described them as part of a political persecution against him and his family, as well as a «new form of coup d’état».
The SAC must now also evaluate the constitutional complaint filed by two lawyers close to Castillo against the Attorney General of the State, accused of changing the prosecutor who was mainly in charge of the case investigating irregularities within the Peruvian Presidency.
The lawyers close to Castillo argue that the prosecutor would have tried to obstruct and weaken the action of her institution in the framework of the investigations faced by her sisters, judges Enma and Ruth Benavides, by removing from her position the provisional supreme prosecutor Bersabeth Revilla, as reported by the newspaper ‘El Comercio’.