Mexico City
Mexico’s political establishment has been shaken by claims that three former Mexican presidents and an all-star cast of lawmakers and aides may have been involved in alleged acts of corruption.
The accusations were leveled by Emilio Lozoya, the former head of Mexico’s state oil company Pemex, and will boost efforts by the country’s current president, Andrés Manuel López Obrador, to portray himself as an anti-corruption crusader.
López Obrador, a 66-year-old nationalist, swept to power in 2018 pledging to rid Mexico of corruption and unseat the “mafia of power” he claimed had seized control of Latin America’s No 2 economy.
In a leaked 63-page deposition, Lozoya, who was extradited from Spain in July to face corruption charges of his own, dragged some of Mexico’s best-known politicians into a rapidly unfolding scandal.
According to the newspaper El Universal, the former Pemex chief implicated Enrique Peña Nieto, Mexico’s president from 2012 until 2018, in multimillion-dollar bribes and illegal campaign financing.
Reuters said Lozoya also claimed that Felipe Calderón – president from 2006 until 2012 – and Carlos Salinas – from 1988 to 1994 – had committed “acts possibly constituting crimes”.
Lozoya worked as international relations coordinator of Peña Nieto’s 2012 election campaign, and was later appointed to run Pemex.
“He was one of the masters of the universe,” said Rodolfo Soriano-Núñez, a sociologist in Mexico City. “He was appointed to that position because he was part of Peña’s most intimate circle.”
Lozoya was arrested in Spain in February and extradited to face charges he received more than $4m in bribes from the Brazilian construction giant Odebrecht.
On Thursday morning López Obrador, who is widely known as Amlo, told reporters he believed the leaked document was genuine but had not read it all because he “wouldn’t want to have nightmares”.
Reporters gather around a car, part of a convoy believed of transporting Emilio Lozoya after his extradition from Spain, in Mexico City last month.—AP
