The Colombian Attorney General’s Office announced on Friday afternoon that it is ready to charge former Foreign Minister Alvaro Leva Duran with criminal malfeasance in the complex case of a failed tender for passport printing. The indictment body submitted an official request to the Supreme Court in Bogotá to determine the date of the hearing that will be held against the former minister, and today the major opponent of Gustavo Petro. He accuses him of committing crimes by declaring invalid the multi-million dollar process to select the person responsible for manufacturing the passports, since the temporary consortium of Thomas Greg & Sons had met the requirements to obtain the contract. According to the Public Prosecutor’s Office, Leva had issued a series of administrative acts of infringement.
The announcement of this official investigation against the leftist president’s first foreign minister comes just two days after the Attorney General’s Office requested a similar hearing, but also preventive detention, against two of Leyva’s former colleagues in the Cabinet: former ministers Ricardo Bonilla, of the Treasury, and Luis Fernando Velasco, of the Interior, over the UNGRD corruption scandal.
The Public Prosecution’s decision against the veteran conservative politician comes in conjunction with the disciplinary penalty imposed on him by the Public Prosecution, which became final last September for the same matter. Leyva, 83, will not be able to hold any public office or any popular election for another 10 years, according to the penalty of dismissal and disqualification confirmed for the second time by Attorney General Gregorio Eliach. The Attorney General’s Office found that the then chancellor committed a very serious disciplinary offense by declaring the public tender for passports invalid when Thomas Greig had already been approved, because he “ignored the principles of transparency, economy and responsibility governing public procurement.”
In 2023, the company began a process to sue the state for 117 thousand million pesos, or about 30 million dollars, although it withdrew it last January. During the nearly three years that had passed, it had maintained part of the functions it would have acquired under the contract, as the executive had deemed it necessary to involve it directly because there was no person responsible for manufacturing the books.
Adding to Leyva’s criminal chaos, El Pais newspaper revealed that Leyva sought Trump’s complicity in the United States to overthrow Petro, his former boss, whom he accused publicly and without evidence of suffering from an addiction problem that might prevent him from ruling. According to audio recordings and testimonies obtained by this newspaper, the former advisor met with advisors close to the Donald Trump administration and tried to communicate with Marco Rubio, the Secretary of State, with the aim of convincing him to help exert “international pressure” that might lead to Gustavo Petro’s departure from power.
News in development…