The Minister of Finance, Rodrigo Cerda, valued the determination of the General Bank of the Republic to officiate BTG Pactual, Moneda Asset and Altis, three companies that manage the fortunes of President Sebastián Piñera, in addition to the Commission for the Financial Market (CMF), to ask them for information on their blind trusts due to a possible conflict of interest of the Mandatario with the Enjoy casino chain.
Minister Cerda said that “what you are going to allow is going to be just to get any doubts out there. We value what the Contraloria is doing, so hopefully it’s a relatively quick process for all Chileans to be calm about it.”
In the same line, the government spokesman, Jaime Bellolio, pointed to T13 radio that “by reviewing the Contraloria compliance with the law on blind trust, everything will be clear”. The secretary of state held that “all the lies and fake news that have been made about this, are going to be discredited.”
Let us remember that the case was released by journalist Alejandra Matus in the True Lies program of The Network, noting that an investigation by the Chamber of Deputies into the casino industry and the Superintendency revealed that the firms that manage the President’s wealth are engaged, “whether by guarantee ballots or because they are ensuring Enjoy’s debt” , where the chain “stays afloat even though it has been virtually broken since 2017”.
According to Cooperativa, two years after the Superintendency granted operating permits to five Enjoy casinos, they requested a term extension, which were authorized before February 28, 2020.
However, a signed decree signed in January this year and of which Contraloría took reason, authorizes the regulator to “extend the respective extension granted for the execution of the works, at the request of the operating companies, only for once and for reasonable reasons, for a period not exceeding 6 months”.
On this, the head of the tax wallet argued that “the pandemic process has done is that we have obviously had to make different things more flexible. That has meant aid for many people and this sector (casinos), which was very complicated, was extended an additional period so that they could meet certain requirements.”
He said it was “not only a company, but it’s for several companies.”
“In addition, the other important thing is that, if this had not been done that way, surely these companies would not have continued to operate and that would have meant harm to the Fisco,” he said.
