After the dismissal of 19 Petro Peru managers, all linked to the corruption machine of Keiko Fujimori and Martin Vizcarra, the corrupt press of neo-liberalism began a campaign of image laundering of these characters, the former managers, known as the Petro Destructors, cry for the television channels, selling themselves as pro-men and women, sacrosanct and immaculate, with the permission of lobbyists and their “journalist” friends. None of the spokespersons of information terrorism ask Barrientos about the 87 workers maliciously dismissed, about the corruption cases such as Peruvian Airlines, Seamatch, the gigantic debt or the overpricing of the Talara refinery. That is why we wanted to kick off the campaign to tell the truth about these oil “bosses” and their misdeeds.

By Patricio Mery Bell

Petro Destructores: Hospital modular de Talara Covid 19.

While Peru was suffocating from the virus with more than 2,170,000 infected and 199,000 dead, the company Petro Peru tried to fight the pandemic in Talara, where one out of every three inhabitants contracted the disease. To do so, it put out a tender for the construction of an emergency hospital with high-tech medical equipment, an oxygen plant and an autonomous electricity system to treat seriously ill patients. They were racing against time because the pandemic was not giving them any respite. The first tender was declared void. The budgets did not meet the requirements.

In a second instance, the consortium formed by the Ecuadorian company Satec S.A. and the Peruvian company IRPM won the project for 7 million 600 thousand soles. On 27 July 2020, the Consortium signed the contract for the construction of the hospital.

Ghost legal representative

Patricio Urrutia, a Chilean national residing in Ecuador, represented SATEC S.A. in the signing of the agreement, by contract the company would own 90% of the work and should finance the same percentage of the project. What his partners did not know is that neither Urrutia nor SATEC S.A. legally exist in Peru. Patricio Urrutia was not the legal representative of Satec S.A. in Ecuador and the company does not exist in Peru.

In the first days of the project, 240,000 soles worth of construction materials arrived from Ecuador, which represents 2.5% of the amount committed by Satec S.A. to carry out the work. That was all Satec S.A.’s contribution to the project, after which they disappeared and abandoned the construction of the necessary emergency care centre.

Petro Peru and IRPM assumed that they had two options: either they would stop the construction of the hospital, which would condemn thousands to certain death, or they would go ahead on their own. As IRPM was a Peruvian company, and although it was only responsible for 10% of the total construction, it decided to continue with the construction for the good of the community, with the verbal support of Beatriz Alva Hart and Tomás Flores, powerful managers who supported the general manager, Carlos Barrientos. Despite the initial delay, the work was completed in 60 days.

Thirty hospital beds were delivered with their respective equipment, valued at 60,000 dollars each, and 15 ICU beds valued at 20,000 dollars. Of these, only 7 beds remain. It is not known what happened to the rest. It is presumed that they were sold and that the profits went into the pockets of Alva Hart and Barrientos.

“Carlos Barrientos, Beatriz Alva Hart and Tomas Flores allegedly requested the payment of 200,000 dollars in bribes to award the Modular Hospital during the worst moment of the pandemic” according to sources from Consorcio SATEC S.A. and IRPM.

IRPM, seeing that Satec S.A. did not send the promised investment, decided for the good of the community and so that the people would have the hospital, to assume the total cost of the work for an amount of 8 million 800 thousand soles, although by contract they were only responsible for 10%. Of this Petro Peró has only paid 5 million soles, Tomás Flores is said to have demanded 200,000 dollars from IRPM in order to speed up the payment of the almost one million dollars owed to date. Beatriz Alva Hart, for her part, maintained in one of her last administrations as manager of Communications and Social Management that 90% of the payment should be paid to the company Satec S.A. despite the fact that this entity did not carry out any work and abandoned the project.

“The whole delay in the work was reported to Carlos Barrientos, former general manager of Petro Peru, through the managers Tomas Flores and Beatriz Alva Hart, but they insisted that the project go ahead despite the fact that Satec S.A. did not comply. Beatriz Alva Hart demanded the payment of 90% of the invoice for Satec S.A. as if she was the representative of the company and not Petro Peru”, says a Petro Peru source who worked directly with Carlos Barrientos and who knew about the case.

However, there are already 4 criminal investigations into the case, 2 arbitrations and lawsuits for breach of contract against SATEC S.A.