Sunday 3 February 2013

A quarter of a billion dollars frozen in accounts held by daughter of former Tabasco governor

The PRI's black history: know, remember, share

On January 29th Mexico’s National Banking and Securities Commission (CNBV) froze three billion pesos ($237.8 million) in bank accounts belonging Mariana Granier Calles, daughter of Tabasco’s former PRI governor Andrés Granier Melo.

Ms. Granier Calles was summoned to appear before the Fourth District Court in the Las Gaviotas district of Villahermosa, Tabasco at 10:00 on Friday, February 1st to explain the origin of the money.

It is uncertain whether or not Ms. Granier Calles made her appointment. Court Officials said she had not arrived; however, there were people who claimed to have seen a white Suburban entering the rear of the building, in the parking lot reserved for judges. These witnesses claim to have seen Ms. Granier Calles enter the Fourth District Court dressed in an orange blouse and jeans, and accompanied by two lawyers.

A few days previous the Ecological Association St. Thomas (Asociación Ecológica Santo Tomás), using information obtained from the  Ministry of Administration and Finance (Secretaría de Administración y Finanzas) revealed that “Quinta Grijalva” – the official residence for the governor of Tabasco – cost over a million pesos a month to run due to inflated invoices and wasteful spending.

However, in 2008 the governor and his family recorded only 30,000 pesos in spending, and during 2009 38,000 pesos. In 2010, the amount was 35,000 pesos.

“We are talking about, on a monthly basis, the governor’s family going through a million pesos,” said the association.

There has been an active movement in Tabasco to convert Quinta Grijalva into a public facility, such as a museum, due to the perception that it is too luxurious for the governor. One option is for the residence and grounds to become an ecological park – the reason perhaps why spending inconsistencies with regard to the residence were exposed by the Ecological Association.

Even so, direct fraud of government accounts related to household spending cannot account for one individual amassing almost a quarter of a billion dollars.

The Mexican weekly publication Proceso has also documented that the former governor’s son, Fabián Granier Calles, owns a luxury condo in an exclusive area of Miami, Florida. The son is alleged to have millions of pesos in accounts in Cancun.

Ms. Granier Calles may have requested the protection of the federal courts in order to avoid arrest during the judicial proceedings. Known as an amparo, this functions something like a bail bond and is frequently employed by the wealthy in Mexico to avoid incarceration. 

(TE Wilson is the author of Mezcalero, a Detective Sánchez novel.)




Twitter: @TimothyEWilson
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2 comments:

  1. I really don´t understand how is possible that the dauhter of the Tabasco´s governor has had the talent to increase her savings till touch that crazy amount...
    But making not my self a fool, when it´s more than clear that again there´r happening a kind of bad practices whatever they did, in the public administration, as a citizen of a foot I only have the opportunity not 4 insult or send bad sayings to that person, but 4 make a calling to the New President EPN to tell him that it´s time to reorder the development of those which nowadays are members of his cabinet, the impunity & corruption shoould end other wise he´ll be not gloryfied or honored after his period ends... "Los Mexicanos Estamos Hartos de Este Lastre". "NO ROBEN, POR ESO TRABAJO,PARA DARLES LO QUE NECESITEN" words of my childhood I heard from my father, a kind of person that has not a little of the hungry of those that only seek the advantage of robberies, ba bay! Nice to talk.

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  2. de acuerdo "gibish" - la impunidad es una mancha que mexico ha sufrido desde hace al principio del contacto entre cortez y la gente indigena...ojala que el pueblo pueda sacarla...

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