The Koldo case and the investigation of Begoña Gómez, wife of the President of the Government, have become two of the great political assets of the Popular Party and Vox, both in the final stretch of the European elections and in the day-to-day life of the opposition. . While the Congress and the Senate develop two practically identical investigation commissions and constantly double the list of those summoned, the PP also promotes commissions in territories where it governs such as the Balearic Islands or Madrid, repeating appearances that read the same papers and seeking to extend the investigations into the purchase of medical supplies from the wife of the President of the Government, something that the judge of the National Court investigating the ‘Delorme operation’ has ruled out on several occasions.
The first to start were those that still have pending sessions in Congress and the Senate. Both were born in the heat of the arrest of Koldo García, former advisor to José Luis Ábalos in the Ministry of Transportation, within the framework of an investigation for alleged commissions and irregularities in the million-dollar purchase and sale of medical supplies during the first months of the pandemic. But the parliamentary arithmetic of both chambers launched two different commissions, at least on paper.
That of Congress, with a work plan designed by the PSOE and its partners, addresses in generic terms the purchase of health supplies during the pandemic. In the Senate, where the PP holds an absolute majority, Alberto Núñez Feijóo’s party has tried from the beginning to put the focus on the wife of the President of the Government. Since April, a multitude of appearances have been repeated and scheduled in both chambers: Koldo García, José Luis Ábalos, Francina Armengol and Salvador Illa, among many others, have testified in both chambers.
The various appearances have left little information that has not already emerged in the judicial investigation of the National Court. The political and organizational responsible for the purchase of material, both those that are under judicial suspicion and those that are not, have defended the cleanliness of the processes of purchasing and selling medical supplies in the worst of the first waves. The PP, for its part, has focused its efforts on having those appearing detail Koldo’s relationship with senior officials of the Government and the PSOE.
This Friday, three days before the European elections, the president of Congress Francina Armengol had to appear in the Senate. “No one from my government is being investigated,” defended the former president of the Balearic Islands before disgracing the commission for having been called to testify a few days before the elections. This is her third statement in a commission of inquiry about the same thing: she made it in the Senate, previously in Congress and also appeared in the Balearic Parliament.
The purchase of medical supplies from the company involved in the plot and the possible expiration of the million-dollar claim by the current Government of Marga Prohens (PP) is also one of the key points of the investigation that is being carried out in the National Court. And the existence of a third commission in the islands’ parliament has led to a new duplicity of testimonies. Like, for example, among many others, that of Javier Ureña, general director of IB-Salut, who made practically identical appearances.
This custom-made investigative commission was launched by PP and Vox voted on its conclusions this Friday. But the texts confirm what the National Court is already investigating: that there is an alleged corruption plot that sold masks to the Balearic administration during the worst of the pandemic. The conclusions agreed upon by the right include numerous accusations against Armengol and his executive while they exonerate the current Prohens government of having let the millionaire claim to the company of the plot die. In this commission, Koldo García did not directly attend the two times he was called.
Commissions on Sánchez’s family
Wherever it has enough power to do so, the PP directs the investigative commissions not only towards the Koldo case and the management of the pandemic but also towards the family of the President of the Government. In the Senate, the senior lawyer even reproached Alberto Núñez Feijóo’s party for trying to extend the purpose of the commission to Pedro Sánchez’s entourage, and a few days ago a representative from Wakalua (Globalia hub) had to explain in the Lower House that it was not knew nothing about the rescue of Air Europa. This is a line of investigation that the judge in the Koldo case and the Provincial Court of Madrid have rejected.
In Madrid, the Popular Party of Isabel Díaz Ayuso announced this week a commission of inquiry into Begoña Gómez’s master’s degree at the Complutense University. The explanatory statement speaks of supposedly irregular hiring, favored treatment of companies and misappropriation of public funds. It is the same PP that in recent months has rejected any threat of investigation into the relationship between the regional president’s partner and the Quirón group.
This is not the only commission of inquiry opened into the family of the President of the Government. In May, the Provincial Council of Badajoz, at the request of the PP and with the support of the PSOE, agreed to launch a non-permanent study commission on the work of Pedro Sánchez’s brother, David Sánchez, as director of the Performing Arts office. . From the PP they link their appointments to the rise of Pedro Sánchez in the PSOE and in the institutions while the socialists denounce that the PP had not been interested in this matter for years despite the approval of the Provincial Council’s budgets.
Commissions in the Canary Islands, La Rioja and Almería
The first parliamentary investigation commission was not in Madrid or the Balearic Islands. In the summer of 2021, the Provincial Council of Almería saw several senior officials paraded for one of the first cases of fraud in the purchase and sale of medical supplies: the investigation into alleged bribes collected by Óscar Liria, former vice president of the organization for the PP, in the purchasing masks. The conclusions were approved at the end of August 2021 between accusations from the PSOE of having made a “tailor-made suit” of the PP.
The conclusions are clear and exculpatory for the party. “This special investigative information commission does not observe the existence of responsibility in the processing of the files neither of the officials nor of the members of the Popular Party government team,” the text states, while Justice continues to investigate.
Another regional parliament that launched an investigation commission to clarify the purchase of masks was that of La Rioja. It did so in February 2023 with the focus on the purchase of 850,000 defective masks, but the appearances and conclusions declined when the previous legislature ended. The Rioja executive has chosen to commission an external audit after detecting possible irregularities in the purchase of five and a half million masks and does not rule out resurrecting the parliamentary commission.
A final commission of inquiry will begin in the coming weeks in the Parliament of the Canary Islands, an autonomous community where the courts and the European Prosecutor’s Office are investigating up to two cases, in addition to the ramifications of the Delorme operation that affect the islands: prevarication, influence peddling , fraud and money laundering in a purchase of masks, in addition to other proceedings for tax fraud committed by businessmen involved in the purchase and sale of this material.
With the work plan still to be defined, this investigation commission will be launched in the first days of July. After several months in which various people responsible for the purchase of medical supplies during the pandemic will appear in the coming days. Ángel Víctor Torres, Minister of Territorial Policy and former president of the Canary Islands, will be questioned one day after the European elections regarding the awards of his executive to the company Soluciones de Gestión to purchase medical supplies for more than 12 million euros.
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