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Scared mayors flee towns -- disguised as cops
Terrified of being killed like a colleague a month ago, two Peruvian mayors accused of corruption gave pursuers the slip -- disguised as police.
Cesar Eugenio, mayor of the town of Molino on the fringes of Peru's central jungle region, and Antolin Huaricacha, from Asillo near the border with Bolivia, used the same tactic to flee within a day of each other, after angry mobs closed in.
"We had to dress him as a policeman. His whereabouts are unknown, for safety," one officer told Reuters by phone from a nearby town after helping Huaricacha flee in a police van.
The mayor is accused of failing to account for public cash and packing public jobs with his cronies.
Huaricacha's escape on Saturday night mirrored Eugenio's flight on Friday.
"The mayor was afraid the people would lynch him so he escaped dressed up as a policeman. People were out of control and anything could have happened," resident Armando Rivera told Reuters from one of only three telephones in Molino.
Townsfolk accused Eugenio of using municipal trucks to transport fertilizer to his farmland and of bribing judges.
In late April a crowd of mostly native Aymara Indians in Ilave, also near the Bolivian border, beat their mayor to death after accusing him of embezzling local funds.
President Alejandro Toledo vowed to sweep out graft when he took office three years ago but faces nearly daily protests against his government that have pushed his popularity rating down to 6 percent, the lowest in Latin America. Last week he sent new laws to Congress to stiffen penalties for protesters. |
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