Drug Cartel Tied to Vote In Colombia
|
|
Hoping to buy leniency from the future Colombian President, a Cali cocaine cartel leader agreed to donate $3.75 million to the presidential campaign of Ernesto Samper Pizano, according to wiretap tape recordings made public here today. Mr. Samper, who won the presidential election Sunday by the narrowest margin in memory here, denied the charges and demanded a police investigation. His campaign treasurer, Santiago Medina, said, “This campaign did not receive one peso from drug trafficking.” The No. 2 finisher, Andres Pastrana, played the telephone recordings at a news conference and asserted on national television, “If it is proved that the President-elect’s campaign received drug trafficking money, he should resign because his mandate would be invalid.” While some journalists here called the donation offer Colombia’s most serious political scandal of recent years, others predicted that it would eventually fizzle out, as have past denunciations of traffickers’ influence in politics. Past incidents that never went beyond newspaper headlines include a 1991 videotape that showed delegates to Colombia’s Constitutional Assembly accepting envelopes stuffed with cash from cartel emissaries. The Assembly voted overwhelmingly to bar the extradition of Colombian trafficking suspects to the United States for trial. President Flies to U.S. Today, belying a crisis climate, President Cesar Gaviria flew to Los Angeles for the World Cup soccer match between Colombia and the United States. Seeking to appear presidential, Mr. Samper visited a remote Andean region where an avalanche killed about 1,000 Indian peasants two weeks ago. Both Mr. Samper and Mr. Pastrana plan to travel to the United States on Thursday to follow Colombia’s team in the World Cup championship. More : query.nytimes.com |