Mexican authorities investigate cabinet member Manuel Bartlett

Mexico

has opened an investigation into the assets of Manuel Bartlett , head of the National Electricity Company (CFE) , according to the Public Administration Ministry , which investigates complaints against public servants.

On Monday, the government corruption watchdog said the investigation into Bartlett ’s “ declaration of assets and interests” follows an anonymous citizen complaint .

Mexican journalists Areli Quintero and Carlos Loret de Mola last month reported that Bartlett had built up a real estate portfolio comprising 25 properties worth MXN $800 million , far more than the assets reported in his public declaration.

“As I said before, the information regarding properties attributed to me is false. My financial statement is in order,” Bartlett said on Twitter .

“The ( Public Administration Ministry) has opened an investigation and I will present all the documentation and information that is required of me,” he added.

President López Obrador

has expressed support for Bartlett despite accusations he improperly accumulated nearly two dozen luxury properties.

It was the president who tapped Bartlett , a veteran politician with a controversial past, to lead Mexico’s state-owned power utility .

Manuel Bartlett's past

Bartlett

, a former member of the long-ruling Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI) , is well known in Mexico for announcing on election day in 1988 , when he served as Interior Minister , that the vote-tabulating computers had crashed as the main opposition candidate was in the lead.

When the computers came back online, the PRI ’s candidate had won, drawing accusations of fraud from critics .

Mexico takes legal action against Rosario Robles, a former official linked to a massive fraud

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