Puerto Rico Governor Ricardo Rosselló asked for the immediate resignation of Treasury Secretary Raul Maldonado just hours after the cabinet member disclosed a federal corruption investigation into his own department, Bloomberg News reported. Rosselló said yesterday that he’d never been informed of the “serious irregularities” that Maldonado made public. The governor didn’t divulge details about the allegations, which he said are “grave and could represent serious violations of the law.” Rosselló said that Francisco Pares, assistant secretary of internal revenue and tax policy, would become the acting treasury secretary. Christian Sobrino Vega, chief executive of the Puerto Rico Fiscal Agency and Financial Advisory Authority, will become chief financial officer, a title that Maldonado had held along with his cabinet post. The moves came after Maldonado told the WKAQ-580 radio station that he was collaborating with the Federal Bureau of Investigation as it looked into influence peddling, destruction of documents and other crimes within his own department. Maldonado suggested in the interview that the blame fell on an “institutional mafia” within his department composed of "officials who have been with the department for many years."
