CC confirms the cancellation of agreements that involved hundred Guatemalan politicians in the Odebrecht case

Home News CC confirms the cancellation of agreements that involved hundred Guatemalan politicians in the Odebrecht case
CC confirms the cancellation of agreements that involved hundred Guatemalan politicians in the Odebrecht case

On October 11, 2012, Congress approved millionaire loans for a road project on the CA-2 West route. The favorable vote of the deputies, according to statements of effective collaborators, was paid in cash. However, these testimonies cannot be used in the judicial process.

The First Appeals Chamber annulled the effective collaboration agreements signed by the Public Ministry (MP) with two former deputy. The Special Prosecutor’s Office against Impunity (FECI) tried to reactivate them. He presented an amparo before the Supreme Court of Justice (CSJ), which refused to grant it provisionally. In the sentence stage, the judicial authorities did not give the investigating entity right.

The last option for prosecutors was to go to the Constitutional Court (CC), where they interposed an appeal with the hope that this Court ordered a favorable resolution to reactivate the agreements.

But almost 13 years after the alleged payment of bribes to 105 deputies, the CC resolved on September 17, 2025 to reject the appeal, with which the effective collaboration agreements continue annulled.

The alleged bribe to the deputies

The effective collaboration agreements managed by the MP were signed with the former deputy Emilennee Mazariegos and Édgar Cristiani, both members of the bench of the former patriotic party (PP) in the seventh legislature, from 2012 to 2016.

Sources with knowledge of the case indicate that the testimonies link 105 of the 108 deputies who voted in favor of the 4583 initiative, approved of national urgency.

This initiative authorized two loans for the execution of the project called “Rehabilitation of the existing route and four-lane extension of the CA-2 West route”.

Roxana Baldetti, former vice president, and Alejandro Sinibaldi, former Minister of Communications, stand out in several corruption investigations.

For this, Congress approved a loan with the National Bank for Economic and Social Development (BNDES), for US $ 280 million, and another for US $ 119 million 400 thousand with the Central American Bank for Economic Integration (BCIE).

The investigations pointed at Carlos Batres Gil as an intermediary between the construction companies associated with Odebrecht and the deputies to whom he would have paid for his vote.

Batres Gil would have managed a series of loans to gather the necessary money and deliver, in cash, Q300 thousand to each of the deputies involved.

The evidence of the former deputy would have allowed prosecutors to gather indications for an eventual criminal prosecution against more than 100 politicians.

The case allowed the capture of Batres Gil, who, through his lawyers, successfully challenged the effective collaboration agreements of the former deputy, which prevents their statements from being legally used.

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