QUITO (Reuters) – Ecuador\u2019s Vice President Maria Vicuna announced her resignation on Tuesday, one day after President Lenin Moreno relieved her of duties amid an investigation into payments she received as a legislator years ago.<\/p>\n
Vicuna\u2019s resignation was the second time a vice president left since Moreno took office in May 2017. Moreno on Monday assigned Secretary General Jose Augusto Briones with the duties of vice president, without specifying for how long.<\/p>\n
Prosecutors are investigating funds that Vicuna received from a former adviser between 2011 and 2013 while she was a legislator for former leftist president Rafael Correa\u2019s Country Alliance (AP) party. Moreno said he took the decision so she could defend herself, but she had remained in office until resigning.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe President of the Republic has reiterated his concern for me. I understand that relieving me of duties was a way to ensure my legitimate right to defense,\u201d Vicuna wrote in a public letter.<\/p>\n
Last week, Vicuna acknowledged receiving the payments, but said they were voluntary contributions for a political organization aligned with the AP. She said she refused the adviser\u2019s requests to be named to government posts and as a result is now \u201ca victim of slander.\u201d<\/p>\n
Vicuna, previously urban development minister, replaced former Vice President Jorge Glas last year while he was under investigation in a corruption scandal centered on Brazilian construction company Odebrecht, which has admitted paying bribes to win infrastructure contracts across Latin America.<\/p>\n
Glas, a close ally of Correa, was later found guilty and sentenced to six years in jail on charges he pocketed a roughly $13.5 million bribe from Odebrecht.<\/p>\n
Moreno ran for president with Correa\u2019s endorsement but has largely broken with his predecessor\u2019s populist approach in favor of a more orthodox, market-friendly economic policy.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
QUITO (Reuters) – Ecuador\u2019s Vice President Maria Vicuna announced her resignation on Tuesday, one day after President Lenin Moreno relieved her of duties amid an investigation into payments she received as a legislator years ago. Vicuna\u2019s resignation was the second time a vice president left since Moreno took office in May 2017. Moreno on Monday assigned Secretary General Jose Augusto… Read more »<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":106,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2683","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-article"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/theamericasblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2683","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/theamericasblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/theamericasblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/theamericasblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/106"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/theamericasblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2683"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/theamericasblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2683\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2684,"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/theamericasblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2683\/revisions\/2684"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/theamericasblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2683"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/theamericasblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2683"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/theamericasblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2683"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}