Colombia’s Supreme Court called National Electoral Council (CNE) magistrate Alvaro Hernan Prada to trial over his alleged attempts to bribe a witnesses.
According to Senator Ivan Cepeda, Prada’s first day in court will be held next week.
The CNE magistrate has been charged with conspiracy to bribe witnesses because of his alleged involvement in a criminal organization that bribed witnesses for the benefit of former President Alvaro Uribe.
Prada allegedly recruited a former member of paramilitary organization AUC to bribe a key witness in the investigation into Uribe’s alleged ties to paramilitary group “Bloque Metro.”
At the time of the alleged conspiracy, the CNE magistrate was a House representative of Uribe’s far-right Democratic Center party.
The trial was announced hours after Prada and his colleague Benjamin Ortiz asked the CNE to investigate alleged electoral law violations by the 2022 campaign of President Gustavo Petro.
The president’s coalition, Historic Pact, recused the allegedly criminal magistrate for his alleged political motivations.
Prada, once appointed as CNE magistrate, would have sought his election as investigator in the case against the president, this after having resigned his seat in the Democratic Center in the Congress of the Republic to evade an investigation of the Supreme Court against him for alleged bribery in criminal proceedings as an accomplice.
Historic Pact
According to Petro’s political allies, Prada has used all kinds of legal and illegal means to block Petro, “his campaign and the political project he is leading.”
As evidence, Historic Pact gave the court 66 pages of evidence of the magistrate’s public hostility against the president and leftist politicians like Cepeda, a victim of Uribe’s alleged conspiracy to bribe witnesses.
The Supreme Court has alleged that the CNE magistrate took part in the Uribe conspiracy in an attempt to advance his political career.
Prada has categorically denied resorting to criminal activity.