Lima - The latest scandal involving President Alejandro Toledo features a 23-year-old police officer who has posed on the cover of Peru's leading news magazine with her midriff exposed and 9mm pistol drawn.
For months, rumours that Lieutenant Lady Bardales was romantically involved with Toledo were strictly fodder for Peru's tabloid press, which dubbed her "Lady Bi" - an allusion to Britain's Princess Diana.
But last month Bardales' brother, a police officer in the northern city of Chiclayo, allegedly beat up a television news reporter who had shown up to interview her family.
With the April 2006 general election approaching, Peru's legislature, which has a 9 percent approval rating compared to Toledo's 12 percent, seized the opportunity.
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| If she had received favours from someone who made use of public funds |
A congressional commission subpoenaed Bardales to explain how she managed to buy land worth more than R300 000 and a 1997 Honda on a monthly police salary of about R3 500.
The commission's president said the probe was strictly to determine if she had received favours from someone who made use of public funds.
Bardales arrived at Congress on Monday with two lawyers and a phalanx of bodyguards.
Some lawmakers were infuriated when the commission, stacked with legislators aligned with Toledo's government, agreed to Bardales's request to hear her testimony behind closed doors - a move usually reserved for issues of national security.
Earlier this month, Bardales told Caretas magazine that she inherited the land. - Sapa-AP
- This article was originally published on page 4 of The Star on May 20, 2005
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