Spanish
Bogotá.- The wife of Colombian presidential candidate Santiago Botero, Manuela Echeverri, reported him to the authorities for alleged domestic violence hours before the elections and obtained protection measures from a Family Police Station in Cartagena, according to an official document known this Saturday.
The decision was made the day before this Sunday's presidential elections in which Botero, a far-right radical who advocates the use of violence and firearms against crime, is running as a candidate after registering his aspiration by collecting citizen signatures.
The politician and businessman, who presents himself as an anti-establishment figure and often refers to his followers as "templars", registers a voting intention of less than 1% in the most recent polls.
According to the ruling issued on May 29 and released today, the candidate's wife denounced "acts of violence in the context of the family" allegedly committed by Botero and warned that the last ones occurred on Thursday 28.
As a response, the Police Station ordered a series of measures to protect the woman and her ten-month-old child, such as changing the keys and access to the family apartment and that these were delivered exclusively to Echeverri, and ordered to prevent any movement of assets of the marital society while the process advances.
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The document also sets restrictions on the candidate and notes that authorities may limit their access to items "that may facilitate aggression, such as firearms".
According to family commissioner Amín Sanabria Aislant, as reported to local media, officials were attempting this Saturday to execute the measures and allow Echeverri to enter the home after, according to the complaint, Botero prevented her and her baby from entering the property.
The official also assured that the procedure encountered resistance from Botero, who "dug in" inside the apartment while the authorities were trying to execute the order.
For his part, Echeverri's lawyer, Alberto Boek, stated that the complaint was filed approximately a month ago and that new episodes of alleged psychological and economic violence were subsequently recorded.
The police station summoned both Echeverri and Botero for psychological evaluations and for a hearing within the process.
In a statement released after the news broke, Botero rejected the accusations and assured that the situation is part of an attack motivated by political interests in the final stretch of the presidential campaign.
"This is about an attack with political interests, an attack that seeks to prevent this country from having a change. And if you look at the attack they are making on me, they don't have a single piece of evidence," said the candidate, who also maintained that he maintains a separation with Echeverri.
After the controversy, a video of an interview from months ago with Semana magazine went viral on social media in which the candidate states that he is willing "to shoot" his father, mother, son or wife.
