2024-04-02 14:35:57
The Christian Social Party (PSC), responded to the commotion caused by the testimony of Mayra Salazar if Metastasiswith a clear message: “Individualized statements and actions do not involve the PSC.”
In a statement released on the afternoon of this Friday, March 29, 2024, through the Instagram account of its historical leader, Jaime Nebot, the National Board of the PSC emphasized “our gratuitous detractors have dared to mention an alleged control of the party in the Judiciary Council in exchange for favors.”
On Thursday, March 28, Mayra Salazar, former collaborator in the Guayas Court of Justice, offered an unsworn version at the National Court of Justice. Salazar is one of the 52 people prosecuted in the Metastasis case, which originated from the decryption of chats of drug trafficker Leandro Norero. The Prosecutor’s Office investigates the extent of the infiltration of organized crime in the highest levels of the State.
During his testimony, Salazar pointed out Pablo Muentes, former PSC assemblyman, as a key figure. According to the witness, Muentes “managed the majority of members of the Judiciary Council,” the regulatory body of the Judicial Function in Ecuador.
Salazar stated that the former assemblyman paid for her services at the Guayas Court of Justice, where she worked as an advisor to Fabiola Gallardo, to whom she had to inform about all movements. The meeting to hire him took place at Muentes’ house, on Mocolí Island, which according to the witness, functioned as the “operations center.”
Below is the verbatim transcript of the PSC statement, released this Friday, March 29:
“In the face of actions and statements that are in the public domain, the Social Christian Party emphatically indicates:
1. Individualized statements and actions do not involve the PSC. Our gratuitous detractors have dared to mention alleged party control of the Judiciary Council in exchange for favors.
2. Control? If the PSC had that control. I would not maintain for several years that the Judicial Council should never have existed. Nor would it have acted, as it has done since 2022, proposing and sponsoring all political trials to achieve the dismissal of its members: Terán, Morillo, Muñoz, Murillo, and Barreno.
3. Favors? The Social Christian Party, in no part of the country, has appointed or had judges or prosecutors appointed. The party does not have officials of any kind in the judicial function. The PSC has not prosecuted or issued sentences for or against anyone; neither defended nor achieved the release of any person.
4. None of the denounced actions imply benefits for the PSC or its leaders.
5. It is not surprising that clerks and employees, in some cases, accept the versions of the accused as valid and, on the other hand, do not do so in other noisy cases of alleged corruption.