"El Chapo" paid Rs.712cr bribe to Ex-Mexican President : Trial Witness

Guwahati: Accused Mexican drug Lord Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman who paid around rupees 712crores bribe to former Mexican President Enrique Pena Nieto has been testified on Tuesday.

Alex Cifuentes, who has described himself as Guzman's one-time right-hand man while interrogated by Jeffrey Lichtman at Brooklyn Federal Court about the alleged bribe he said that it was true. However, Pena Neito or his former spokesman could not be reached for comment who previously denied of taking bribes.

“The declarations of the Colombian drug trafficker in New York are false, defamatory and absurd,” wrote Francisco Guzman in a post on Twitter, adding that the Pena Nieto government “located, detained and extradited” the Mexican kingpin.

The allegations which began in November are among the most explosive to emerge from Guzman's trial. Guzman was even extradited to the United States in 2017 to face charges of trafficking cocaine, heroin and other drugs into the country.

Meanwhile, Cifuentes told U.S prosecutors that Pena Neito initially asked around 180 crore rupees to the Guzman and that the bribe was paid in October 2012 when Neito was president-elect. He also said that the Guzman once told him that he had received a message from Pena Neito where he mentioned that he does not want to live in hiding anymore.

Moreover, Lichtman had promised jurors that they would hear in his opening statement how the Mexican drug kingpin Ismael "El Mayo" Zambada bribed Pena Neito and said that Zambada was the real boss of the cartel. On the other hand, Pena Neito called the claim as completely false and defamatory.

Pena Neito was the President of Mexico from December 12 till November 2018 and was also a rising star in Mexico's long dominant institutional Revolutionary party and was also the former governor of Mexico. But the President has to end his term in a much diminished figure, pummeled by conflict of interest, scandals, rampant crime and a lackluster economy.

Guzman who was captured by Pena Neito's government in February 2014 broke out of prison for a second time some 17 months later escaping through a mile long tunnel dug right into his cell. Neito's government was humiliated after the jailbreak and battered the President's already damaged credibility although after the announcement of Kingpin's third capture by Neito himself when he was again arrested in Northwestern Mexico in January, 2016.

On Tuesday, Cifuentes also testified that Guzman asked an associate to pay around 72 crore rupees bribe to a general but the witness said that the bribe was never paid and that the Guzman subsequently ordered the associate killed which has not been carried out.

Also Read: ‘Mexican drug lord’s recapture marks start of extradition proceedings’