Paraguay's former president Santiago Peña will stay in custody while the investigation into the collapse of Ueno Bank goes forward. Judge Humberto Otazú, of the Juzgado Penal de Garantías de Delitos Económicos (the Paraguayan criminal court for economic crimes), ordered pretrial detention on Saturday, 7 November 2026, a day after the Senate found him guilty of malfeasance in his impeachment trial. The order still stood on Sunday. Peña is held at the Regimiento Guardia Presidencial, the presidential guard barracks in Asunción, where he was taken on Friday.
The judge justified the detention by the need to keep the former president available to the courts during the proceedings. No trial date has been set.
The charges: up to ten years in prison
The charges were brought by the Unidad Especializada de Delitos Económicos y Anticorrupción (the Paraguayan prosecution service's unit for economic crime and corruption). Prosecutor Christian Benítez told a press conference that Peña faces counts of breach of trust, as an instigator, and of administration for personal gain, as a principal. In their aggravated form, both offences carry sentences of up to ten years.
According to the accusation, Peña took part in placing, rolling over and keeping large sums belonging to public bodies and pension funds at Ueno Bank. Prosecutors are also examining his earlier ties to Grupo Vázquez, the bank's owner: before taking office he held 1.58% of Ueno Holding, a certificate of deposit at the bank and a bond issued by the firm Itti. That stake was sold in March 2025, when he was already running the executive.
1,196,000 payments in two days
The Banco Central del Paraguay (BCP, the Paraguayan central bank) is running the repayment operation for clients of the bank, which was placed under intervention and then wound up over solvency problems. The failure reached some 2.94 million clients, among them individual savers, pensioners and public bodies.
Its interim head, Pedro Acosta, said 1,196,000 people had already been paid in the first two days of disbursements, which began on Thursday, for a total of 996 billion guaraníes — about 160 million dollars, according to the BCP itself. The money is routed through the Fondo de Garantía de Depósitos, Paraguay's deposit guarantee fund. Several banks opened outside normal hours on Saturday to set up new accounts and speed up transfers.
The pace is fast, but the arithmetic shows how much is left: the payments reported cover roughly 41% of the affected clients. The government has not given a deadline for completing the repayment.
Alliana's first cabinet
Pedro Alliana, Peña's vice president and now head of state, spent the weekend at the Palacio de López, the seat of the Paraguayan government, in working meetings with ministers. His stated priorities are the supply of medicines to public hospitals and support for those hit by the Ueno failure.
Alliana announced his team, with Ariel Martínez at the Interior Ministry and Rolando de Barros as head of the Civil Cabinet. The new vice president, Antonio Barrios, said the executive would ask allied countries — which he did not name — to help trace where the bank's money went. Alliana also wrote on X that he was committed to strengthening the strategic alliance with the United States.
Uruguay recognises the new president
Uruguay's foreign ministry issued a statement on Sunday recognising Alliana as president of Paraguay and wishing him success in the post. It added that Montevideo would keep strengthening bilateral cooperation and integration within Mercosur. Uruguayan president Yamandú Orsi had exchanged messages with Alliana on Saturday.
Paraguay's presidency thanked Uruguay on X. The recognition comes less than a month before the bloc's summit, due in Montevideo in early December, with the presidents of Argentina, Brazil, Paraguay and Uruguay expected to attend.
With information from Canal 26, EFE, Prensa Latina and the Banco Central del Paraguay.
