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Paraguay President Impeached 44-0 in Bank CollapseWorld
Paraguay’s Senate has removed President Santiago Pena from office over the collapse of Ueno Bank, and prosecutors placed him under house arrest within the hour.
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Pedro Alliana became president of Paraguay on Friday after the Senate impeached his predecessor over a banking crisis that locked almost half the country out of their accounts.
Senators voted to remove President Santiago Pena after a one-day trial, with 44 of the 45 senators voting in favour and one lawmaker absent. Senate President Basilio Nunez declared Pena guilty of poor performance in his duties. Alliana, the former vice president, was sworn in as the country’s 53rd president within the hour and will serve until August 2028.
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Minutes after his removal, Paraguayan authorities placed Pena under house arrest, prosecutor Silvia Margarita Gonzalez Vester told reporters. He is due to be questioned on Saturday over alleged crimes of breach of trust, influence peddling and misappropriation of funds. The Attorney General has opened three criminal cases against Pena and other former officials related to the bank crisis, and the impeachment vote stripped him of his parliamentary immunity.
The crisis centres on Ueno Bank, a digital lender that began as a small fintech company and grew rapidly into a major bank handling state pensions and the accounts of several state entities. Regulators seized the bank on November 3 after its solvency fell below the required level, leaving nearly three million customers unable to access their money.
Pena had offered his resignation over the disaster on Thursday, but lawmakers pressed ahead with impeachment. The lower house had voted 78-0 to impeach him the same day. Opposition lawmakers accused the president, who until last year had a stake in Grupo Vazquez, which controlled Ueno, of a conflict of interest, which he denied. Prosecutors said they were investigating acts related to the supervision and resolution of Ueno Bank and the placement of public funds in the bank.
Hundreds of people waiting outside Congress celebrated the impeachment. “Justice has been done. Now we want him to give us back our money and go to jail,” Jessica Aquino, 32, told AFP. Thousands had demonstrated for a third consecutive night on Thursday in Asuncion and other cities to demand the return of their money.
Alliana promised not to abandon the almost three million depositors affected, including pensioners. “Compatriots who are now going through a difficult time as a result of the financial collapse will be fully compensated,” he said.
Advance payments to an unspecified number of affected depositors began on Thursday afternoon, a Central Bank official told AFP. The first phase of aid deposits, up to around $1,600, will go to clients who do not have loans and have an account at another bank or institution in Paraguay to receive the funds, said Jose Maciel of the Central Bank’s Deposit Guarantee Fund.
The scandal has also claimed the heads of Central Bank President Carlos Carvallo and Interior Minister Enrique Riera, while eight Ueno executives have been arrested and police have raided locations linked to Grupo Vazquez. Opposition lawmakers had also filed a motion to impeach Alliana over the crisis, but the request failed to gain congressional approval. Pena is only the second Paraguayan president removed through impeachment since 1989.
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