The conservative president confronted a legislative panel weighing whether or not he ought to retain his immunity from prosecution.
Rodrigo Chaves Robles has turn into the primary sitting president within the historical past of Costa Rica to testify to a legislative committee as he confronted costs of corruption and the potential of a legal trial.
The three-member committee held the listening to on Friday to think about whether or not or to not raise Chaves Robles’s immunity as president.
Doing so would pave the way in which for Chaves Robles to be prosecuted based mostly on allegations he used government-related funds to present kickbacks to an ally.
Chaves Robles has denied any wrongdoing and accused his opponents of utilizing the judiciary to oust his authorities.
“What we’re experiencing has historic penalties,” Chaves Robles stated on Friday. “Your complete nation is witnessing a authorized rigging by the legal professional common and the legal courtroom.”
He instructed his supporters outdoors the Legislative Meeting that his adversaries had “staged a ridiculous case to hold out a judicial coup d’etat” and persuade the general public he was a “scoundrel”.
The committee should ship a report following Chaves Robles’s testimony to the total Legislative Meeting, which can then vote on whether or not to strip him of his immunity from prosecution.
A conservative economist and former minister of finance, Chaves Robles has been accused of forcing an affiliate to take cash from a contract awarded by a improvement financial institution, the Central American Financial institution for Financial Integration, and use it to pay his former presidential adviser, Federico Cruz.
The sum was allegedly $32,000, and Cruz used it to purchase a home, in response to prosecutors.
The financial institution instructed the Reuters information company that it had performed its personal inner investigation, the conclusions of which have been offered to Costa Rica’s legal professional common. Witnesses for the prosecution embody the president’s former communications minister, Patricia Navarro, and businessman Christian Bulgarelli.
“I by no means ordered the supply of cash to anybody,” Chaves Robles stated in response to the allegations.
His lawyer, Jose Miguel Villalobos, additionally argued that the accusations don’t meet the “minimal necessities” for the elimination of presidential immunity.
The Legislative Meeting would want a supermajority as a way to strip Chaves Robles of his immunity.
Chaves Robles was thought of a darkish horse candidate when he ran for president in 2022, representing the conservative Social Democratic Progress Social gathering.
Even then, nevertheless, he confronted scrutiny for allegedly working an unlawful parallel marketing campaign financing construction. A number of ladies additionally got here ahead to accuse him of sexual harassment throughout his time employed on the World Financial institution.
Chaves Robles is ineligible to run for a second time period in 2026: The legislation doesn’t allow back-to-back presidential phrases.
Costa Rica is scheduled to carry its subsequent presidential election on February 1, and Chaves Robles’s time period is slated to finish the next Could.
