Colombian prosecutors said the Attorney General’s Office will file corruption charges against Ricardo Roa, the president of state-run oil company Ecopetrol, and also pursue an influence-peddling case, according to a statement released Monday. Prosecutors said the allegations reach back to Roa’s time managing finances for President Gustavo Petro’s 2022 campaign.
Prosecutors said Roa managed the finances of Petro’s 2022 presidential campaign and that they have enough evidence to prove he helped the campaign illegally exceed spending limits. Roa, an engineer who has served as Ecopetrol’s chief executive since April 2023, will be prosecuted in the corruption case, prosecutors said.
In the influence-peddling allegations, prosecutors said Roa steered Ecopetrol contracts toward a company tied to a business owner who sold him a luxurious apartment in Bogota at a steep discount. Prosecutors said the contract-routing and the apartment deal are linked to the alleged wrongdoing.
Roa has denied the corruption charges and has also denied accusations tied to the campaign exceeding spending limits, according to the Attorney General’s Office account carried by the Associated Press. The prosecutors’ announcement comes as Colombia prepares for congressional and presidential elections later this year.
The legal pressure on Petro’s political circle has been building for months. In 2023, the Petro presidential campaign faced scrutiny after a lawyer representing a government contractor who had links to a paramilitary group said the contractor’s client had donated thousands of dollars to the political campaign, the AP report said.
In a separate but related thread, Nicolas Petro — the president’s son — told prosecutors in 2023 that funds from a former drug trafficker were used in his father’s campaign. Nicolas Petro is under investigation for money laundering.
Prosecutors said Roa also faces a case after the National Electoral Council fined him and two other campaign administrators in November. The fine, prosecutors said, was imposed for allegedly exceeding spending limits and for funding the campaign with money from illegal sources.
Petro’s term is also approaching a political constraint: the constitution bars presidents from seeking reelection, according to the report. Petro has asked voters to back candidates who support his economic reforms and to back lawmakers who support a rewrite of the constitution, even as the campaign and its financing-related legal disputes continue.