Colombia’s Agriculture Minister Juan Camilo Restrepo said Tuesday that days before the end of his term, the administration of former President Alvaro Uribe ordered the transfer of $27 million (COP50 billion) in subsidies to flower exporters.
The minister’s revelation comes amid an investigation into money flows from the former government’s Agriculture Ministry to flower exporters. The exporters are accused of having used government loans, intended to compensate them for the appreciation of the peso in 2008, to buy real estate in Ecuador and to financially support the political campaign of former Agriculture Minister Andres Felipe Arias, who aspired to be the Conservatives’ 2010 presidential candidate.
Minister Restrepo told Caracol Radio that the government is trying to recover the $27 million, as $14 million of the 2008 loan cannot be accounted for.