Colombian president Abelardo De La Espriella ordered an Air Force investigation on Saturday 10 October into allegations that former first lady Verónica Alcocer secretly flew to Venezuela on official aircraft. Former government adviser Eva Ferrer made the claims, which remain unproven. Ferrer hasn't publicly produced the documents or photographs she described, and no one named in her allegations has been charged.
Flight claims and evidence
Ferrer told Semana journalist Vicky Dávila that Alcocer was the hidden head of a group that used presidential power for profit. Asked whether Alcocer led a mafia, Ferrer replied, “As of today, I say yes.” Semana published the interview on 10 October 2026.
Her most specific allegation involved a trip to Venezuela in January 2023. Ferrer said Manel Grau, a Catalan businessman close to Alcocer, told her that Alcocer brought back US$2.5 million. She said some of that money was intended for a campaign by Mario Fernández Alcocer, a politician and Alcocer's cousin. Ferrer's account rests on what she says Grau told her; his comment wasn't available in the account.
Ferrer also said, “It seems there are photos of Verónica getting off the plane with grey suitcases that had drugs inside.” She didn't show the photos. Asked whether the trips used state aircraft, she said they flew on “the presidential one or the first lady's one.” The available account said it wasn't known whether official flight records supported her description or whether the photos exist.
Ferrer also connected people around Alcocer to arms dealing, named Italian businessmen and accused her circle of selling jobs in state bodies, including the oil company Ecopetrol. Those claims, like the allegations about the flight and drugs, remain unproven in the account.
Air Force and prosecutors asked to act
De La Espriella, described as a conservative lawyer who succeeded Petro in August, said he had asked the Air Force commander for an “exhaustive investigation” into the events Semana described. The Air Force's Inspector General and counter-intelligence units will examine current and former crews of CATAM, the military air transport command that flies official aircraft. De La Espriella said the Air Force would remove any members found involved from service, and they must answer to the courts.
He also asked the Attorney General's Office, the Supreme Court and the Procuraduría, the public-conduct watchdog, to act within their powers. He made the same request of “the authorities of the United States.” The Attorney General's Office hadn't said by Saturday whether it would open a case, and it remained unclear what U.S. agencies would do with the request.
Senator Christian Garcés, a member of Centro Democrático, urged Attorney General Luz Adriana Camargo to open an inquiry on her own initiative. Senator Germán Rodríguez of Salvación Nacional said Alcocer could end up in prison. Neither statement establishes the truth of Ferrer's accusations.
Disputed accounts and existing sanctions
Ferrer said she spoke out because she feared for her safety. She told Semana that a caller once asked whether she wanted to be shot and that she had been in hiding for two months.
María Jimena Duzán, a veteran Colombian journalist, said on X that Ferrer gave her a “different version” in a podcast interview on 14 August. Duzán suggested Ferrer's new interviews were meant to pressure Alcocer's circle into paying fees Ferrer said she was owed. In the August interview, Ferrer said she was owed four months of fees and denied using threats to obtain money or a job.
Alcocer had denied earlier accusations. After Semana published audio recordings of Ferrer in August, Alcocer wrote to Attorney General Luz Adriana Camargo that the claims “lack any basis and do not correspond to reality,” and offered to cooperate with prosecutors. Petro, then still president, called the reports a slander that should be answered with criminal action, La Silla Vacía reported. Agmeth Escaf, a congressman from the Caribbean coast whom Ferrer also accused, rejected the claims and said he had launched a civil lawsuit and criminal libel complaint against her.
The allegations come amid a U.S. sanctions case. The U.S. Treasury designated Alcocer, Petro, Petro's eldest son Nicolás Petro and former minister Armando Benedetti under counter-narcotics rules. Their assets in the United States are blocked, and U.S. persons are generally barred from dealing with them. Colombian media reported all four remained on the list after a recent update. The allegations about the flight now put official aircraft records and the conduct of military air crews at the center of an investigation ordered by Colombia's president.