Former presidential candidate and leftist senator Gustavo Petro said Thursday that former President Álvaro Uribe could also have joined the Inter-American Human Rights System, which protected the former mayor’s political rights, this week.
Petro spoke with EL TIEMPO about the decision of the Inter-American Court of Human Rights (IACHR), which determined that public servants elected by popular vote can only be stripped of their political rights by means of a sentence issued by a judge.
In Petro’s case, the Office of the Attorney General of the Nation dismissed and disqualified him in 2013, when he was serving as mayor of Bogotá, for alleged irregularities committed in the change of toilet model for the capital.
(You may be interested in: Paloma Valencia says that the Inter-American Court ruling would apply to Uribe)
Faced with these events, the former mayor presented several legal remedies, in Colombia and abroad, until the Council of State reversed the decision of the Public Ministry and the IACHR protected his political rights.
Precisely Petro referred to the investigation that the Supreme Court of Justice is conducting on former president and former senator Álvaro Uribe for his alleged relationship with the manipulation of witnesses and in the middle of which he was ordered to house arrest.
If Uribe wanted to continue being a senator while he is being prosecuted, with respect for the Supreme Court of Justice, even with an assurance measure, I would believe that this is debatable
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In this regard, Petro affirmed that in the case of the ex-president it is a matter of seeing “if we have to wait for the conviction to remove political rights” or if it is done “previously.”
(Recommended: Senate accepted resignation of former President Uribe from his seat)
“I think we have to wait until the conviction. That is what the Convention says,” said the former leftist presidential candidate.
Petro clarified, in any case, that in the case of the former president, he “resigned”, but that “if Uribe wanted to remain a senator while he is being processed, With respect for the Supreme Court of Justice, even with an assurance measure, I would believe that this is debatable. “
For Petro, there is ‘extortion’ to the mayors
Regarding the IACHR ruling that protected his political rights, the former left-wing presidential candidate affirmed that mayors, governors and councilors “live under permanent extortion” by some control bodies at the regional level.
(You may be interested in: Petro’s harsh attack against former attorney Alejandro Ordóñez)
“If the official is honest, it is when he has the most pressure from the control bodies, and in general it is not because these bodies are exercising their constitutional functions, but because they are of political origin,” he said.
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