On the week, Justice ruled a 14 month sentence on probation to the now former Mayor Pablo Caram, being charged due to irregularities in the payment of overtime to different officials of the northern Departmental Government.

Other officials of the Municipality had been condemned for the alias Overtime Case as they were related to Caram, one of them his niece who is now former legislator for the PN, Valentina Dos Santos, who was found guilty of usurpation of functions.

The scandal in the Artigas City Hall not only shakes the National Party and the governing alliance in an election year, but also creates questions about Caram’s succession.

The former mayor expected the position to be filled by Dos Santos, disqualified by the judicial conviction according to the interpretation of constitutional lawyers.

From the PN, the presidential candidate Álvaro Delgado considered inappropriate that the former legislator, who resigned from the party, assume the highest departmental position.

Another candidate, Senator Guido Manini of the Cabildo Abierto party, considered the corruption facts in Artigas as “shameful.”

Ho is expected to perform an institutional act to appoint the replacement mayor, but at this point there is no clarity as to who will take up the post.

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