Pettovello accused of being part of an alleged corruption scheme she exposed

Human Capital Minister Sandra Pettovello has been accused of being involved in an alleged corruption scheme that she herself denounced.

The civil association Arco Social filed a complaint on Monday against Pettovello, claiming that she was part of an embezzlement scheme within the ministry, consisting of signing contracts with an international organization to appear to be paying people who didn't actually work there.

Pettovello filed a similar complaint on Saturday, accusing former Secretary of Children, Adolescence and Families Pablo de la Torre of being behind the project. De la Torre was fired for his role in another ministerial scandal involving undelivered food to soup kitchens for which the minister is also targeted.

The accusation against Arco Social targets not only Pettovello but also De la Torre and Luis María Scasso, director of the Organization of Ibero-American States for Education, Science and Culture (OEI, by its Spanish acronym), l international organization accused of being involved in the scandal.

According to the complaint, the department hired people through OEI to make it appear as if approximately 100 people “who never performed any work” were actually working for the office. The goal was to “carry out an embezzlement scheme and use that money to pay (extra illegal money for those involved) and purchase U.S. dollars on the black market.”

The complaint adds that the contracts amount to one billion pesos ($1 million at the official exchange rate or $770,000 at the MEP rate) and were approved by the former De la Torre Children's Secretariat.

The OEI released a statement on Saturday acknowledging having signed two agreements with the ministry in February. One of them is for “food purchases,” while the other is for what they call “temporary staffing services.” The latter, they added, was agreed with the Children's Secretariat to hire service providers based on the needs of the secretariat. Pettovello also signed both deals.

“The secretariat was solely responsible for the selection of profiles,” underlines the press release, adding that the OEI was limited to implementing “the decisions and procedures” established by the government agency.

The complaint said this arrangement allowed Pettovello and De la Torre to avoid legal procedures for hiring people in order to “achieve their ultimate goal: the misappropriation of these funds.”

According to Arco Social, this is a “criminal scheme” that involves “falsifying official documents and creating false employment reports” to cover up the deception. They also asked the judiciary to trace where the OEI money ended up and see how it was used to investigate whether other crimes had been committed.

The Ministry of Human Capital has sought to distance itself from these accusations. According to Argentine media, they filed a complaint against De La Torre on Friday after Federico Fernández, former director of the secretariat, informed ministry representatives about the irregular contracts.

According to the ministry's complaint, OEI money was exchanged for dollars and used to pay people who worked in the secretariat but were not officially on staff, as well as “low-wage” civil servants. He added that Pettovello was not aware of this.

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