The Colombian Supreme Court of Justice summoned Nicolás Petro Burgos, the president’s first-born son, to testify Gustavo Petroand the businessman Euclides Torres about the alleged irregularities in the financing of the president’s campaign. This was confirmed to EFE this Tuesday by a source from the Supreme Court of Justice, who pointed out that this is part of the preliminary investigation of congressmen Pedro Flórez and Agmeth Escaf, both from the ruling coalition Historic Pact, for the alleged illegal financing of the Petro’s presidential campaign in 2022.

This investigation was opened last October when Petro’s son mentioned them in statements to the Prosecutor’s Office after being arrested for alleged illicit enrichment and money laundering.

Nicolás Petro and his father’s campaign

Petro Burgos has been investigated by the Prosecutor’s Office since March 2023 for the complaints from his ex-wife Daysuris Vásquez -who has reached a collaboration agreement with the accusing body- that received money from dubious businessmen and noted drug traffickers for the presidential campaign of 2022 from his father. After his arrest, the president’s son acknowledged, according to the Prosecutor’s Office, that he received money for the campaign of former drug trafficker Samuel Santander Lopesierra and Gabriel Hilsaca Acosta, son of the controversial businessman Alfonso ‘Turco’ Hilsaca. Part of that money supposedly went into his father’s presidential campaign in 2022, although Petro Burgos assured in an interview with Semana magazine that the president did not know.

Petro has distanced himself from these accusations and has asked that this case be investigated diligently and even went so far as to say that he hoped that the arrest of his eldest son would lead him to “reflect on his own mistakes.”

Meanwhile, in September Semana magazine published videos of an investigation by the president’s son at the Prosecutor’s Office in which he claimed that his father “knew perfectly” that Euclides Torres, a businessman from Barranquilla “was the one who financed the campaign.” “I mentioned it to him several times, he knew it (…) When we traveled to events, (Senator) Pedro Flórez always went, so he and I talked about the financing, which Euclides financed,” he said during the proceedings. which took place on August 2, before being called to trial and breaking his collaboration with the Prosecutor’s Office.

This financing is apparently illegal because it was not reported to the National Electoral Council (CNE), according to the president’s son. Euclides Torres, according to an investigation by the digital media La Silla Vacía, is a businessman who leads a group in charge of executing public lighting concessions in 15 municipalities in the country, through “business camouflage.”