
Ecuadorian legislators, ministers and former officials were accused yesterday of having ties to companies linked to the Albanian mafia after the National Assembly (Parliament) declassified documents from the Companies Supervision.
Ricardo Vanegas, a member of the Assembly, revealed nine names of suspects involved, including parliamentarians Dalton Bacigalupo and Xavier Santos from the Democratic Left (ID) and Fernando Cedeño from the Union for Hope.
All three deny the accusations and ask the Superintendence of Companies to clarify the matter. He also mentioned Darío Herrera, the current Minister of Transport, as well as other former heads of ministers and former legislators. According to Vanegas, this information does not mean that they are part of a mafia or that they have committed a crime.
Some consider the allegations to be part of a political mission by Vanegas to deflect attention from President Guillermo Lasso, whose brother-in-law had ties to Albanians involved in drug trafficking, according to audio and documents.
In addition, there is evidence that the president knew about these connections and did nothing about it, which may be one of the bases for the political judgment that the opposition will soon present to the Assembly.
From yesterday's discovery regarding the members of the Parliament, it resulted that the companies with direct and indirect connections or connections with Albanian citizens in the province of Manabí alone, would amount to more than 306. Some of the companies are dedicated to the production and marketing of cannabis.
In one of them, located in Cotopaxi, an Albanian appears as administrator and shareholder. This citizen also appears as a shareholder or administrator of fourteen other companies. In addition, in some of these companies he was associated with Rubén Cherres.
This cannabis company, in turn, has ties to at least fourteen other companies. The documents give the names of the owners and shareholders of all these companies.
Another of the observed companies is one dedicated to activities in the city of Portoviejo. Although there are no partners or investors of Albanian nationality in this company, it repeats the scheme of connections with other companies where Albanians appear.
Another of the reports is the Analysis of the risk of money laundering, financing of terrorism and financing of the proliferation of weapons in Albania. This document identifies eleven Albanians who appear in 26 companies as partners or investors.
" From the share base that is in the magnetic medium of the Supervision of Companies, Securities and Insurance, 11 Albanian citizens appear as legal representatives and shareholders in 26 companies in the corporate sector," the document states .
Of these eleven citizens, one appears on the "convicted list" and has 25% of the shares in one of the companies. Of the 36 companies in which Albanians participate, 23 are joint stock companies, 2 are limited liability companies and one is a simplified joint stock company (SAS).