The ‘Koldo case’ has already definitively mutated into the ‘Ábalos case’. The Supreme Court has set a date for what may be the first statement by former Minister José Luis Ábalos before Justice for the most serious corruption case of the Pedro Sánchez era. The instructor Leopoldo Puente intends to question him “voluntarily” on December 12.
The former head of Transport and Secretary of Organization of the PSOE is not obliged to appear given his status as a certified person, although sources close to him suggest that he will attend given that it was he who asked to be able to testify. In any case, if he finally does not do so, the judge will ask Congress to lift his immunity through a request to be able to summon him in a matter of weeks.
This will end a flight forward that has lasted for months since last February the PSOE suspended the former militancy minister and expelled him from the parliamentary group after the alleged involvement of his former advisor Koldo García in the corrupt network that nested in the Ministry of Transport that Ábalos directed. between January 2020 and July 2021.
On the 27th of that month, six days after the arrest of his former right-hand man, Ábalos spoke for the first time about this matter in Congress and insisted that he would not resign. “If I resigned it would be interpreted as a sign of guilt, which I do not accept.” The former minister declared himself willing to defend his “honorability” and denied having enriched himself thanks to the business of the plot.
It was the first chapter of a defense strategy based on grandiose statements, recurring excuses and victimhood. Ábalos has not skimped on public interventions in which he has firmly defended his innocence, has expressed disappointment with his party for having been expelled and has denounced a conspiracy against him. All with the aim of denying his involvement in the face of the avalanche of increasingly consistent suspicions about his involvement in the events that appeared as the investigation progressed.
“Relevant role”, according to the UCO
At first, the former socialist minister was able to argue that in months of investigations the investigators had not been able to gather obvious evidence against him. But last October a forceful report from the Central Operational Unit (UCO) once again put all the spotlight on him. The Civil Guard attributed him a “relevant and responsible role” in the plot and verified the “consideration” that he allegedly received from Víctor de Aldama, a businessman unrelated to the health sector who earned 6.6 million euros at the worst moment of the crisis. pandemic thanks to mask contracts awarded by entities that depended on Transportation and other departments.
Aldama put the final touch on it on October 21. This businessman, whom the Civil Guard identifies as the “corrupting nexus” of the plot, voluntarily sat before one of the two judges investigating him and corroborated and expanded with his statements some of the indications exposed by the investigators in their reports. . Particularly, what related to the bites on Ábalos, which the UCO had not yet been able to prove.
According to the commission agent’s version, the former minister would have received about 650,000 euros in cash. To the 250,000 that would have been given in commission for the more than 53 million sold in masks to the Ministry of Transportation, another 400,000 would have to be added in many other payments. Koldo García, apart from payments in kind, would have received another 200,000. Ábalos denied the accusations made against him and stated that he will study criminal actions against Aldama given their “seriousness and falsehood.”
The Supreme Court expands the investigations
By then, the UCO had already left in writing in its report two strong incriminating evidence against Ábalos: the enjoyment of a villa in Cádiz in exchange for his intercession in contracts and the payment by Aldama of the rent for the luxury home in Madrid whose partner he was. Despite this, during this time Ábalos has lavished public interventions and interviews in which he has declared his innocence and has tried to show himself as a victim of a lynching that has affected his “privacy.”
Two weeks after receiving that report, the judge of the National Court Ismael Moreno asked the Supreme Court to investigate Ábalos given the “founded and serious indications” of his “main role” in the plot. In its resolution, it attributed three crimes: criminal organization, for its “main role” in the network created by Aldama to obtain business with public administrations; influence peddling, for his “intervention” in the awarding of mask contracts to the plot and for two public companies to hire his partner; and bribery, for the chalet in Cádiz that the plot made available to him “as payment for his mediation” in contracts and the payment of his partner’s rent.
Now, the Supreme Court judge is based on that writing by Judge Moreno to act against Ábalos, but also to expand his investigations. Thus, it assumes the jurisdiction to investigate Aldama and Koldo García, who will be obliged to give statements in the Supreme Court on December 16 and 17. The high court instructor considers that the events for which both are accused are “directly and inseparably” related to those committed by Ábalos.
In his order, he recalls that the aforementioned reasoned statement placed Aldama as the person who would have achieved his “own economic benefit” by accessing the award of certain contracts through “certain payments or economic considerations” and “taking advantage of his influence over Koldo García and about Ábalos himself.” Regarding Koldo García, the instructor remembers that his colleague from the National Court had already identified him as the “link” between Aldama and Ábalos.
These are the elements that Judge Leopoldo Puente takes into account to assume the main part of the investigations. On the other hand, it points out that the National Court must continue with the investigation regarding all the other investigated, among whom are the businessman Juan Carlos Cueto, the wife and brother of Koldo García or the commander Rubén Villalba. The special court will also continue to investigate aspects that are not related to the assessment and that could be attributed to Aldama and Koldo García, such as crimes against the Public Treasury and money laundering.
Source: www.eldiario.es
