The ex president Sebastián Piñera testified as witness before the prosecutor Pablo Gómez, in the context of the inquiry driven the Public Ministry because of the polemic around the mining royalty law.
The scandal emerged after the emails between the CEO of SQM, Patricio Contesse and Pablo Longueira (at that time the Economy Minister), were disclosed.
As part of the information swap, Contesse would have sent to Longueira a text, which would be included, without any modification, as part of this project of law. This way, the article has been named as ” the Contesse article”.
Owing to the antecedents, the Prosecutor, has required to some members of the Government, who participated at the processing of the law, as witnesses. Among them, Juan Andrés Fontaine, Felipe Larraín, and Laurence Golborne.
However, the first to testify before the prosecutor, was the ex president Sebastián Piñera, who explained he decided to testify as volunteer. The procedure was accomplished this Tuesday morning, in the house of the ex head of State.
Through a public statement, Piñera assured he decided to collaborate voluntarily with the investigation, ” for clearing up the fundaments, contents and results of the mining royalty law”.
“My decision of cooperate voluntarily with the investigation related to the mining royalty law, approved during our Government, arises from the purpose and permanent attitude of confront every situation and act with transparency facing the Chilean society and State’s organisms”, he stated.
