María Fernanda Rojas, the Minister of Transport of the Petro government, joined yesterday different voices in the country demanding a thorough investigation not only into the shady contracts that have been hastily arranged at the Civil Aeronautics Authority (Aerocivil), but also the appointments linked to a single family clan.
For several weeks now, when Rojas requested a special audit from the Comptroller’s Office for that entity – due to complaints about opaque contracting processes – the rumor gained strength that a recently graduated young woman was pulling strings of power at Aerocivil: the 20-year-old law student Gabriela Muñoz Olaya.
Angie Rodríguez’s whistleblower
The rumor escalated when Angie Rodríguez, once the right hand of President Gustavo Petro, made several accusations that she even turned into a complaint against the president before the House Commission on Investigations and Accusations: “It wasn’t just Juliana Guerrero. There is, for example, a lady named Gabriela. At one point, she managed the Civil Aeronautics Authority at her whim. Her name is Gabriela Muñoz.”
And now, Minister Rojas herself came out to denounce that Aerocivil is providing her with incomplete information about the service contracts she ordered to be delivered. And that some contracting processes were taken down when she demanded the information be published: “It’s disrespectful. I will take all actions and I will not hesitate nor will I silence my voice with whatever I have to denounce or warn about.”
The women’s network
Juliana Guerrero is scheduled for trial on August 20 for falsifying her university diplomas. And over the weekend, President Petro came out to defend her after complaints from Semana magazine about an alleged bribery network to award projects in the government.
Regarding Gabriela Muñoz, reports indicate that she and her brother Santiago David (who appears on social media as a pilot) were a kind of behind-the-scenes power. In fact, the latter is linked to an alleged incident on July 15, on the fifth floor of the entity, after a meeting with Luis Alfonso Martínez Chimenty, head of Aerocivil.
EL TIEMPO’s Investigative Unit exclusively established that the Muñoz siblings’ mother is Liliana Olaya Cabrales, coordinator until a few days ago of counterintelligence at the powerful National Intelligence Directorate (DNI), which depends on the Presidency.
“She resigned two days after the incident at Aerocivil,” said a government source and assured it is false that she still works at the DNI as some sources claim.
This newspaper contacted Olaya, who, although she refused to talk about her link to state counterintelligence, admitted that she recommended her two children and four nephews to be hired by the entity.
The Muñoz clan
“I recommended them, they are newly graduated and others are still studying. Two are engineers and two are high school graduates. I recommended them to General Pinto, former director of Aerocivil. They don’t earn millions as they say and I told them to fulfill their duties”, Liliana Olaya told EL TIEMPO.
And she said that she would not talk about her work because she feared for her safety.
One of Gabriela Muñoz’s cousins on the payroll is Daniel Felipe Arias Olaya, who has an active contract to provide assistance services to support operational, logistical, and institutional relations activities of the Citizen Service Office (OAC).
Also listed is Samuel Muñoz Rayo, who has a contract to provide support services in management activities related to document management. The list also includes Juan Manuel Galindo Muñoz, who provides professional services in technical matters to support planning processes, quality management, and documentation at Aerocivil, for 70 million pesos.
And finally, Silvana Muñoz Jaramillo, a cousin of the clan. It is being verified if another young woman close to the Muñoz Olaya family has a contract to provide administrative support services in the subdirectorate of collections groups. She has three more contracts, two with the Ministry of the Interior and another with the Fiscal and Parafiscal Management Unit.
Other sources from the outgoing government assured EL TIEMPO that Liliana Olaya, a psychologist by profession, arrived at the DNI through Jorge Lemus, once a trusted man of Petro, whom she met at the Bogotá Fire Department when the president was mayor of the capital.
Verification at Ecopetrol
“Liliana’s job was to collect and analyze counterintelligence information,” an official from the entity told EL TIEMPO and assured it is not true that she continued going to the office.
What they did point out is that among the information that has reached control agencies, there is a request to establish if another key Aerocivil official had contact with high-level personnel from Ecopetrol: “The official lost the competition at the National Civil Service Commission. But she has been placed in several positions.”
EL TIEMPO contacted Olaya again to ask about this matter, but she said she would not speak further and hung up. However, sources from the state company will request a review of the entry logs to verify the information.
Minister Rojas has already announced that she will report to control agencies the alerts she has received about what is happening at Aerocivil.
The director has remained silent. But Gabriela Muñoz has come out to reject the accusations against her and associates have come out to assert that it is a respectable family and that, in fact, an associate may have been linked to the M-19.
(Check here all the articles from EL TIEMPO’s Investigative Unit)
The incoming government of Abelardo De La Espriella had already requested that million-dollar contracts at Aerocivil be halted and now the audit results are awaited.
INVESTIGATIVE UNIT
u.investigativa@eltiempo.com
@UinvestigativaET
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