Oscar Puente dismisses the president of Adif, Angel Contreras

September 13 () –

The Minister of Transport and Sustainable Mobility, Óscar Puente, has dismissed the president of Adif, Ángel Contreras, with the aim of “boosting the management of the company,” according to government sources confirmed to Europa Press.

This dismissal follows several dismissals carried out by the minister in recent months due to the audit related to the ‘Koldo case’, although the Ministry stresses that the dismissal of the president is not related to this matter.

However, Contreras had been in office for less than a year when Puente’s arrival at the Ministry replaced the previous president, María Luisa Domínguez.

The former president of Adif had to appear before the Senate in the framework of the commission of inquiry into all the ramifications of the ‘Koldo case’, where he assured that “he had never rigged any type of contract.”

Contreras argued that his relationship with Koldo – who appeared to be implicated in the UCO report – was limited to the “social level” after the departure of José Luis Ábalos’ former advisor from the Ministry at the end of 2022.

He also said that they had met for coffee on one occasion and even ate twice at ‘La Chalana’ and on another occasion with former minister José Luis Ábalos when he was already a deputy.

For his part, Óscar Puente has already defended on several occasions that he would dismiss any official in the Ministry who was implicated in the case. For the moment, in addition to Contreras, he has already dismissed the Secretary General of State Ports, Álvaro Sánchez Manzanares; the Undersecretary of State, Jesús Manuel Gómez, and the Chief of Staff of Adif, Michaux Miranda; for their status as suspects in the ‘Koldo case’.

Aside from this corruption plot, the head of Adif was also under pressure from the numerous incidents that occurred this summer on the railway network.

This Friday, at Madrid’s Atocha station, there were delays of an average of 50 minutes on the high-speed line due to a signalling fault. Traffic was interrupted before 2:00 p.m., although it was restored around 3:30 p.m.