Appearing this Wednesday before a special commission of the Legislative Assembly analyzing the financing of the parties in the last election campaign (2022), Vargas reiterated that his attacks on the Internet against certain local journalists were in response to a specific request from the Minister of Health Joselyn Chacon.
Vargas also implicated MP and bench chairman of the ruling Social Democratic Progressive Party (PPSD), Pilar Cisneros, as instigating these messages against Costa Rican reporters questioning the health chief’s work.
He specified that the order received from these officials was to crack down on the media hostile to him, as well as on opposition MPs, particularly those from the National Liberation Party and the Broad Front (FA).
During his performance, it was shown through evidence presented by both Vargas and Cisneros that the current health chief knew Calandrelli (Vargas) was a troll since October 2021 and nevertheless continued to keep in touch with him, even including him in a campaign, promoted and paid for by her in her ministerial role.
In this regard, FA MP Ariel Robles pointed out that the best evidence, curiously enough, was provided by the ruling party in relation to the screenshot provided by Cisneros of an exchange on the WhatsApp social network between Calandrelli and Chacón to show that it was the troll was who offered his services.
Accordingly, Calandrelli told Chacón that he manages more than one profile on social networks and has 700,000 followers.
In a press conference this Monday, President Rodrigo Chaves, defending himself at all costs, decided to keep Chacón in his post, accusing the troll and two journalists from the digital news outlet CRHoy.com of being “political killers”.
Likewise, the Costa Rican State Department this Tuesday confirmed the opening of an ex officio investigation into the health chief for the alleged crime of embezzlement to determine whether or not Vargas was paid with public funds.
On the other hand, the Costa Rican Institute for Research and Education in Nutrition and Health (Inciensa) confirmed this Thursday the first three cases of the XBB.1.5 subvariant, known as Kraken, of the SARS-CoV-2 coronavirus that causes Covid -19., and with greater spreading power due to its ability to evade the body’s immune response.
The weekly report of the Health Surveillance Directorate of the Ministry of this sector reflects this Friday the accounting of 5,712 new cases of Covid-19 between January 1 and 7, 2023 (first epidemiological week), which corresponds to an increase of 734 new positives SARS- CoV-2 compared to epidemiological week 52 of 2022.
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