By Global News Service
According to an investigation by the newspaper El Mostrador, the San Sebastián University (USS) may have paid an exorbitant and unjustified salary of 17 million pesos per month (around $18,000 per month) to professor Marcela Cubillos, former minister of education in the second administration of former right-wing President Sebastián Piñera and current mayoral candidate for Las Condes, a municipality located northeast of Santiago. The report has drawn the attention of the Attorney General’s Office, which has decided to open an investigation for a possible criminal offense.
Thirty people linked to the Chilean right wing who held positions in the Piñera government were later hired by the San Sebastián University.
Also under investigation is an apparent conflict of interest by the Piñera government regarding USS, which, despite being a private university, received 45.5 percent of its income in 2023 from the Chilean state in the form of scholarships or Government Guaranteed Credit (Crédito con Aval del Estado). This has less to do with the allocation of scholarships or other items that USS received (aid that any Chilean university can ask for) and is more about the enormous amount of money the university received during the Piñera administration. For example, during the government of Michelle Bachelet, the USS received around 1.1 billion pesos. Under the Piñera government, that amount tripled, reaching more than 3 billion pesos in 2021.
from the Peoples Dispatch / Globetrotter News Service
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