Temístocles Ortega Narváez, former governor of Cauca, was accused before the Supreme Court for irregularities in the construction of an airport

For the Prosecutor’s Office, Ortega Narváez, entered into Contract No. 1040 of 2014 “without observing compliance with the following essential legal requirements.” The first requirement corresponds to that in the pre-contractual stage “The corresponding soil studies were not carried out, since it can be stated with probability of truth that those used and signed are supposedly false.”

The second requirement corresponds to the fact that “the structural calculation reports for the box culvert required for the work were not carried out in an adequate manner.

Another requirement that would have been violated has to do with “the absence of an environmental license for the contracting of the work.”

“In the pre-contractual procedure, compliance with the requirement was supported, with a document that can be stated with probability of truth that it is false,” the Prosecutor’s Office said in its brief.

For this reason, the accusing body pointed out that the above “leads to the conclusion that Governor Temístocles Ortega Narváez, as legal representative of the Department of Cauca, and maximum advisor of the planning of the Government, by preterming several essential budgets and which were announced in the antecedent essential requirementsfor the conclusion of the contract, violated the principles that must be observed by those involved in state contracting.”

In February 2023, Ortega was appointed as Colombia’s ambassador to Chile, but approval was not received due to this investigation, so the position is currently held by Sebastián Guanumen Parra.