Supreme Court Orders Mexican President to Turn Over FilesMexico's Supreme Court has ordered President Vicente Fox to deliver files on five companies that were involved in an illicit funding to the former ruling party, local press reported Saturday.In response to the complaints by the Congress, the Supreme Court ruled that the information sent by the Executive Branch last September was incomplete. Under the new ruling of the court, Fox has eight days to order the National Banking and Securities Commission (CNBV) and the Finance Ministry to turn over the complete files. Congress is investigating the allegations that the Banco Union, which was taken over by the government in 1994, offered fake loans of some 25 million U.S. dollars to the five companies, but the money actually went to the former ruling party, the Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI), which has been in power for 71 years until last December. The money has never been paid back by the PRI and now taxpayers have to take up the bad debt as part of the government's enormous bailout of failed banks in the mid-1990s. The government took over failed banks and their bad debt after the banking sector collapsed in 1995. There are complaints that some of these banks made questionable and illegal loans. |
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