Ñuñoa Councilor Files Complaint Against Mayor Sichel for Document Forgery and Data Manipulation

Original article: Ñuñoa: Concejal presenta querella contra alcalde Sichel por falsificación de documentos públicos y de datos informáticos

The councilor for Ñuñoa, Andrés Argandoña (FA), has filed a complaint against the municipality’s mayor, Sebastián Sichel, «and all those responsible» for the alleged crime of forging public documents and manipulating digital data.

«When authorities fail to meet basic standards of integrity, it is our duty to hold them accountable,» stated Councilor Argandoña after presenting the legal action. This follows a report made in late October regarding the lack of delivery of evaluation minutes for the competitive funds intended for social organizations in Ñuñoa.

«In response, throughout October we only received an email with a link that indicated the list of awarded and non-awarded projects. Then, on November 4, the mayor informed me that he had filed a criminal complaint against me, claiming that the evaluation minutes we alleged had not been provided were actually accessible via the link,» recounted the center-left councilor.

He added, «However, upon re-examining the link, we noticed in the metadata of the webpage and the documents uploaded that the files had been modified on November 4, the same date the mayor filed his complaint against me.»

«Furthermore, the links to the documents and the minutes were also created on November 4, the same date as the complaint. This means it was impossible for those documents to have been uploaded on the date stated by the mayor,» asserted Argandoña.

«For this reason, I am filing this complaint against the mayor for slander and against all those responsible for the forgery of public documents and data manipulation,» emphasized the Ñuñoa councilor.

Meanwhile, fellow councilor Alejandra Valle expressed that it is «serious that the mayor is threatening councilors with personal lawsuits, in order to silence us while we carry out our oversight duties.»

«These actions are necessary because they involve municipal funds that go to social organizations, which must be scrutinized to ensure transparency. That is what we have not witnessed thus far,» the councilor and journalist added.

We will continue to provide updates.