Daily Times

Mexico’s former economy minister Ildefonso Guajardo, one of the architects of a revamped North American trade deal, appeared in court on Friday charged with illicit enrichment, prosecutors said.

The judge decided there were sufficient grounds to proceed with the case against Guajardo, who served under former president Enrique Pena Nieto (2012-2018). Guajardo played a key role in the negotiations leading to the United States-Mexico-Canada Agreement (USMCA) that came into force a year ago, replacing the 1994 North America Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA). “During the years 2014 to 2018 this individual, as a public servant, probably obtained an unjustified increase in his assets whose legal origin he could not prove,” the prosecution said in a statement. The legal action was launched at the request of the Special Prosecutor’s Office for Combating Corruption, it said.

Guajardo, an elected lawmaker, described the accusations against him as “political persecution,” in comments to the W Radio station. He said he had given the authorities documents showing the legitimacy of transfers of nine million pesos ($450,000) to his personal bank accounts. The judge granted Guajardo provisional release and gave prosecutors and the defense four months to present additional evidence. Guajardo is the second member of Pena Nieto’s cabinet to be formally charged with corruption.

Rosario Robles, a former minister in charge of social development and rural poverty programs, was arrested in 2019 for the alleged theft of more than $300 million. Luis Videgaray, who served as finance and foreign minister under Pena Nieto, has also been accused of graft, according to prosecutors, but there is no legal process against him. In June, Videgaray was disqualified from holding public office for 10 years. President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador, Pena Nieto’s successor, swept to power in 2018 vowing to crack down on corruption.