Congressman Nicolás Petro, son of Colombian President Gustavo Petro, was accused by his ex-wife, Day Vásquez, of having received money from drug trafficker Samuel Santander Lopesierra, alias “The Marlboro Man”, for his father’s presidential campaign, which however never reached that destination.
Vásquez assured in an interview with Semana magazine that “The Marlboro Man” gave Petro’s son, a deputy in the Assembly of the Caribbean department of Atlántico (north), “more than 600 million pesos (about 124,700 dollars today) to dad’s campaign.
“That never reached the campaign legally because he kept that money, and so did others,” added the woman, who mentioned that Nicolás Petro also received 200 million pesos (about $41,500) from businessman Alfonso “Turco” Hilsaca who also did, not They went to the campaign.
The accusations are known hours after President Petro published a statement in which he asked the Prosecutor’s Office to investigate his brother Juan Fernando and Nicolás, who is his eldest son, without giving further details.
Petro made reference to alleged meetings in prisons where, according to some versions, people around him were posing as members of the government to contact criminals and offer to include them in the “total peace” program in exchange for money, a suspicion that falls in his brother but to which his son has not been linked.
The president’s son assured for his part in a statement that, contrary to what his ex-wife claims, he has had no dealings with “The Marlboro Man” or with the “Turk” Hilasca, people whom he said he did not know.
Nicolás Petro added that he has not “received any kind of support, either directly or indirectly” from these people, for which reason he requested “an investigation to clarify and protect my honor and good name.”
