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Pedro Delgado includes senior officials on list of culprits
Posted On 10 Mar 2017
Pedro Delgado, the former presidential adviser, former head of the Central Bank of Ecuador (BCE) and cousin of President Rafael Correa, feels betrayed. He ensures he left Ecuador after an agreement that involved Vinicio Alvarado and Alexis Mera. He was even assigned a lawyer for his defense.
What was the agreement?
I had to give a press conference to recognize the forgery of my economist degree and resign. And Fernando Alvarado, (Leonardo) Berrezueta, who was the secretary of the Presidency, and Alexis (Mera), who explained certain things to me, were there. For example, according to that legal terminology, with that agreement, I promised to return. It was agreed that the lawyer assigned to me would be Caupolicán Ochoa. I do not know if Chiriboga (Galo) already knew, and he said to me: ‘Yes it’s going to be tough, but it’s good that Caupolicán is with you’ (he showed captures of those chats). I arrived in Miami on December 20, 2012, and immediately Ricardo Patiño, Foreign Minister at then, announced that he had asked the US Government to revoke my visa. And Rafael said in his weekly address that I was a traitor, that I ashamed them. Then, those who betrayed the agreement were them.
The only problem at that time was the economist degree, not the Duzac case or his administration at the head of the trust?
That’s right. The only thing that has been judicialized is the Duzac case, and it was done as I have already indicated, in a biased way. The only thing I ask is to remember that when I was in charge, everything was reported on the websites, but everything was erased. And the law that is being discussed now, the play the lambs are doing is incriminating others to protect the large debtors.
Let’s also talk about the case. Does the trial that the then manager of the Deposit Guarantee Agency (AGD), Carlos Bravo, made in the United States to seize the companies and the assets of the Isaias Dassum brothers in Miami was not a backfire?
It is worth putting this into context. Carlos Bravo hired a law firm in Florida to take this case, but he did so without informing the AGD. A few weeks after the departure of Bravo, a letter arrived asking us to provide information to continue the case in the United States. We had to come to Miami to meet these professionals since Bravo had not even notified the Attorney General´s office. Indeed, the lawsuit was an attempted seizure here. Here is a report from the AGD manager, Katia Torres (he mentions that the contracted law firm is Squire, Sanders & Dempsey). The incredible thing about this is that the lawyers had committed to hiring a law firm in Ecuador for advice, and that law firm was that of Juan Falconí Puig, and $ 300,000 were budgeted. Naturally, they ordered not to pay that amount or continue with that advice. Indeed, initiating the process in Florida was not the most appropriate.
But the president has this issue very present.
Apparently. All Rafael is doing is blah blah, because he has not spoken, he has not demanded anything. I could tell Rafael things, despite the criticism of Mera, Patiño, and others who could throw a tantrum. Remember that when the AGD was created, it was done by law, when the AGD disappeared its rights were transferred, by law, to the trust, but Rafael disappeared the trust by decree; therefore, there is no successor of the rights the trust had. So who is going to represent the State in the collection of debts? That is the trick because there is no successor.
