By Senabri SIlvestre
SANTO DOMINGO. Dom. Rep. (AA) – A Guatemalan judge charged Friday former President Otto Pérez Molina and former Vice President Roxana Baldetti in a new corruption case linked to a construction contract.
Miguel Angel Galvez accused the defendants of engaging in fraud, bribery and money laundering.
The pair — already imprisoned for a customs scandal that led to the Perez Molina’s resignation last September — are accused of accepting bribes in exchange for granting a $255 million dollar contract to construct and operate a terminal at Port Quetzal — Guatemala’s largest port.
According to the investigation, Pérez Molina and Baldetti each received $4.2 million in cash from Barcelona-based Grupo Marítim Terminal de Contenedores Barcelona (TCB) to approve the 25-year deal that was signed in 2012.
“I didn’t receive a single cent from that,” Pérez Molina said following the court procedure. Prosecutors are making their case with “testimony rather than evidence,” he said.
Baldetti refused comment.
Ten other individuals are linked to the case, including Gustavo Martínez Luna, former secretary of the presidency, and Juan Jose Suarez, general manager of TCB.
Guatemalan prosecutors and the UN-backed International Commission against Impunity in Guatemala charge that commission from the contracts could have reached as much as $30 million in bribes for national and international managers.
