Peruvian Prosecutor’s Office raids presidential spokesperson’s house for alleged corruption in social program

The Peruvian prosecutor’s office raided the home of President Dina Boluarte’s spokesperson on Tuesday as part of an investigation into alleged acts of corruption in a social food delivery program. There are other government officials investigated in the case, including a minister.

Fredy Hinojosa, spokesperson for Boluarte and head of his advisory cabinet, is investigated by anti-corruption prosecutors for supplying spoiled food for the Qali Warma Program (“vigorous child” in Quechua, an indigenous language spoken in Peru), which feeds to schoolchildren with limited economic resources.

Hinojosa was executive director of this program of the Ministry of Development and Social Inclusion (Midis) between 2019 and 2022 and Boluarte was minister from July 2021 to the end of 2022.

“There is no element of conviction or even evidence that would allow even minimal suspicion regarding my participation in the irregular acts that they did commit,” Hinojosa said before the press as he left his house, after the operation.

Hinojosa was saved from being arrested thanks to a law recently proposed by Congress and enacted by Boluarte, which prevents the figure of preliminary detention from being applied to people under investigation when the crime is not committed in flagrante delicto.

Faced with criticism, the Legislature annulled the rule, but is still waiting for the president to promulgate it so that it takes effect. As it is still in force, the judge denied the prosecutor’s request to arrest him.

The case involves a network of government officials and managers and employees of the food supply company and there are 25 open investigations to determine the possible commission of crimes such as criminal organization, aggravated collusion, influence peddling, among others.

The diligence, which is carried out with special police units, has been carried out since dawn simultaneously in Lima and Huaura, a city 147 kilometers north of the capital, to seize assets and documents that they consider relevant to the investigation.

Among the other officials involved is also the current Minister of Development and Social Inclusion, Julio Demartini, who was vice minister when Boluarte was the head of that entity and is being investigated for the alleged crime of omission of functions for “not having taken timely precautions, observed or having carried out monitoring regarding the acquisitions,” according to the National Prosecutor, Delia Espinoza, in a local media.

The case broke out in October when a television channel Latin revealed conversations from a worker at the food supply company, in which they spoke of alleged bribes made by the company to officials of the Ministry of Health in exchange for favoring it in testing products that had caused poisoning.

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