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As he had previously announced, Mexico President Andrés Manuel López Obrador revealed this morning a series of purchases of personal care products made by the extinct Presidential General Staff (EMP) between 2017 and 2018 that were bought at excessive prices , and he informed that they will file a criminal complaint because of it.
In his morning news conference, the president showed a series of graphics that detail the expenditures of supplies for a presidential flight invoiced on October 27th, 2017, and where it says that they paid MXN $1,074,670 for several products of personal care, such as 486 pieces of eau de toilette for women of the brand “Carolina Herrera,” 1,164 disposable razors , 1,265 pieces of hair gel , 1,215 nail clippers , as well as 1,247 pieces of toothpaste and toothbrushes .
In another invoice dated July 6, 2018 , they paid MXN $216,804 for 400 boxes of white toilet paper, 70 boxes of toilet paper rolls, and 100 gallons of neutral detergent.
López Obrador said that these purchases “ will never happen again ” and confirmed there will be complaints filed due to the expenditures.
“They will never happen again. The mechanism of not presenting information for “national safety” was used. This was not handled by EMP, they were not obliged to present information, and there was only evidence inside and gave general numbers. This is over, there is no secret budgetary appropriation , that’s the reason for this change, this fight to end corruption ” he said.
“That is why double invoicing and other tax-related mechanisms must become serious crimes ; it is possible that false invoices were used in this case.”
In the National Palace, López Obrador stated that his government will buy no more cleaning supplies , “because we have found enough, and if any is bought it will be the minimum. Before buying paper, before buying equipment, check the storage units , the depots, for there can be many office supplies. You can save and not buy for the sake of buying, especially regarding expensive equipment .
“Everything related to cameras, espionage systems (…) If the inventory was made of how much was spent in equipment [they] even [bought] drones, special boats, surveillance systems, monitors, everything. It’s a bit what happened with the purchase of planes and helicopters, in addition to those for the National Defense Army (Sedena), the Navy. In 10 years, they used approximately MXN $70 billion on planes and helicopters, that is why the budget was insufficient,” he said.
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