Bogotá — Colombia’s electoral authority has asked the country’s statistics agency DIAN to hand over information on Ecopetrol CEO Ricardo Roa, who was President Gustavo Petro’s campaign manager for the 2022 elections, according to a document from the National Electoral Council seen by Bloomberg.
The electoral watchdog is investigating the presidential campaign over possible mismatches between income and expenses reported to the electoral authority.
The decision follows recent allegations by Nicolas Petro, the son of the Colombian president, of illegal campaign financing.
Nicolas Petro was charged with money laundering and illicit enrichment in early August. During the 2022 campaign he organized events and fundraising for his father’s campaign in the Caribbean region of Colombia.
Roa, CEO of the majority state-owned oil company Ecopetrol since April, said he was not considering stepping down from the helm of the company during an interview with local media last week.
During the indictment hearing, the Attorney General’s Office said that Nicolás Petro Burgos acknowledged to the prosecutor’s office that he had received money from drug trafficker Santander Lopesierra, who is known in the underworld as “El hombre Malboro” (’Malboro man’).
In Thursday’s stock market trading, Ecopetrol shares fell 0.54%, while a day earlier, after releasing its second-quarter financial report, shares had tumbled 3.42%.
Ecopetrol, Colombia’s largest company, reported profits of $4.1 billion in the second quarter of 2023, 61% less than in the same period last year.
In addition, in the accumulated balance of the first half of the year, profits were 42% lower than those reported in June 2022.
