The Bolivia n justice sent Max Mendoza, the country’s top university ‘student’ leader, to preventive detention, who for more than 30 years has studied different university careers without graduating from any of them, and who has now been charged with the alleged commission of the crimes of uneconomic conduct and usurpation of functions.
Mendoza, 52 years old and detained in Cochabamba since last Saturday, May 21, was elected in 2018 as a student representative of the Universidad Mayor de San Simón (UMSS), a public institution in Bolivia based in the city of Cochabamba, in the center of the country, into which entered in 1989, according to the coordinator of the Anti-Corruption Prosecutor’s Office, Eddy Flores, quoted by ABI.
In 2018, Mendoza was also chosen as president of the Bolivian University Confederation (CUB), one of the highest authorities of the Executive Committee of the Bolivian University (CEUB), a constitutional body in charge of ensuring the programming, coordination and execution of the plans outlined for the university system of the country and that has direct financing from the General Treasury of the Nation, informed RT.
According to prosecutor Flores, Mendoza should have held the presidency of the CUB for only 30 days, since his appointment was as interim national secretary of the CEUB, but his functions in the position extended to the present date, which would have made him incur into the crimes of uneconomic conduct by irregularly benefiting from a salary designated by the State and usurping functions of a position to which he agreed as a substitute, and in which he continued «without meeting the minimum requirements» for such appointment.
“The Public Ministry has maintained that there is uneconomic behavior on the part of this citizen, he has also usurped functions taking into account that he was not the titleholder (of the position) and was in legal substitution“, said the prosecutor, who detailed that Mendoza received from the 18 of May 2018 to May 18, 2022, 21,870 bolivianos (about $3,176.92).
For now, the Bolivian justice decided that Mendoza, who is also accused of obtaining economic benefits such as travel expenses, trips abroad, among others, must serve a six-month preventive detention in the San Pedro jail in La Paz. However, the defendant’s defense reported that he appealed the decision, alleging that the defendant suffers from type 2 diabetes, which is why they asked that the measure be changed to home detention.
Other possible accusations in Bolivia
Flores added that, based on preliminary investigations, Mendoza would have enrolled in at least two university careers, Engineering and Law, since he entered the system in 1989. In fact, the vice-chancellor of the UMSS, Gerardo Carvajal, confirmed to local media that the defendant has been enrolled in Law for 25 years and that in 2021 he only studied two university courses.
“We are in the middle of the investigation stage, the prosecutors commission is going to summon different citizens, witnesses or participants in this case”, said Flores, adding that “when the time comes” they will summon five other co-defendants and may even issue orders of apprehension if they find indications of active participation of those possibly involved in the commission of the crimes.
«We are structuring our theory of the case to be able to establish whether there is the active participation of other people, officials or not within this higher house of studies, as well as in the CEUB», said the prosecutor, who added that once the formal accusation has been made, they have six months to make the inquiries.
Investigations for alleged human trafficking
This Tuesday, the Bolivian deputy Héctor Arce reported that he will send a Request for a Written Report (PIE) to the General Directorate of Migration, to clarify the alleged irregular transfers of people that Mendoza would have executed by organizing trips by Bolivian folk groups to the United States and Europe.
«We want to be informed of how many times [Mendoza] has traveled abroad, if he has traveled on behalf of an institution, if he has traveled with delegations, we need to know this information to corroborate this complaint», the legislator reported in statements released by ABI.
Arce explained that this weekend he received documents on the alleged international trips that Mendoza would have made together with delegations, made up of between 20 and 25 people, and that later only 10 to 15 travelers returned, an alleged irregularity that makes him presume that the student leader organized human trafficking.
“Apparently these people were transferred by him and we are going to investigate that. That is the complaint that has reached us. It is presumed that this work (human trafficking) has been done, that these people were charged for that transfer», said the deputy of the Movimiento al Socialismo (Movement Towards Socialism – MAS), who announced that if these irregular migratory movements are corroborated, he will file a new complaint against Mendoza.
According to Bolivian media, the Mendoza case was uncovered at the beginning of May, after the death of four university students who were victims of a massive stampede of people after the activation of a tear gas bomb inside a coliseum of the Tomás Frías University of Potosí, when a student assembly was held to elect the new representatives of the Local University Federation (FUL).
The event, which shocked Bolivia, left some 70 students injured, one detainee and brought to the fore the alleged irregularities within the CEUB, to the point of registering protests by students from different universities in La Paz requesting the expulsion of Mendoza from that organization, pointing him out as corrupt.
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