The moment that the Popular Party was waiting for so much. Its leaders would have been satisfied with almost anything, but the testimony of Víctor de Aldama met their expectations. Once the placebo effect of the attempt to block Teresa Ribera’s European career was consumed, something more was needed so that people would not think of Valencia and, more specifically, of Carlos Mazón. The aldamazo renews his wardrobe to continue attacking Pedro Sánchez and the PSOE and also improves it. No evidence has been provided to support what the commissionaire claims, but it is even better for the PP. Where testimony does not arrive, the imagination of the plaintiffs will.
Aldama tried to make his statement profitable on Thursday. The same day it was done. He asked the judge of the National Court who placed him in preventive detention for the investigation into a million dollar fraud to release him on parole in response to his collaboration with the other court in charge of the Koldo case . Confessions of crimes are of little use to an investigating judge if they are not accompanied by supporting documents. The anti-corruption prosecutor’s office was still delighted, so much so that it took no more than a few hours to ask the magistrate to grant the request.
Aldama left Soto del Real prison at night in arrogant style. “Don’t worry, Mr. Sánchez, he will have proof of everything that was said,” he told reporters before getting into a car. It was a very fruitful day for him.
What his statement shows is an explanation of the enrichment of the others concerned to whom he says he gave 250,000 and 100,000 euros. José Luis Ábalos and Koldo García have an additional problem. If they cannot substantiate certain income or payments made by them, the instructor may consider Aldama’s version of bribes to be plausible and sufficient to bring the case to trial.
This statement brings closer the time when the case will have to be transferred to the Supreme Court due to the quality of the former minister. Ábalos issued a brief statement in which he rejects “the defamatory accusations” to which he will respond “in court when questioned.”
Politically, the references to Pedro Sánchez carry more – political and not legal – weight. Aldama claims the president asked to meet with him, that they met briefly after a 2019 socialist rally in Madrid, and that he thanked him for what he was “doing” in Mexico. He was then honorary consul of Spain in Mexico and advisor to Globalia, the company that owns Air Europa.
This moment is that of the photo of the two that appeared a few weeks ago on the cover of El Mundo. It is now clearer how this happened at the newspaper. This will increase fears within the PSOE, but they might also think that if this image and these words are the only thing Aldama has against Sánchez, that means he doesn’t have much either.
Sánchez was in Congress in the afternoon to vote on the tax package agreed with his partners. “Everything this man said is categorically false. “His defense strategy is based on lies,” he said of Aldama, whom he also called a “suspected criminal.” He almost took it as a joke: “What an invention. The president did his best to appear as relaxed as if he had just returned from vacation.
Aldama also targeted Minister Ángel Víctor Torres and Santos Cerdán, number three of the PSOE. In this case, the amount he is talking about is so small that it raises serious questions about the credibility of the whistleblower. You don’t have to be cynical to know that if a politician decides to corrupt himself and risk everything, he won’t do it for 15,000 euros (according to this version, Koldo García gave the money to Cerdán in presence of Aldama). . He presents it as part of the bribe which would correspond to contracts limited to Euskadi and Navarra. If he also wanted to involve Ábalos’ successor in the party, he should have come up with a better story. That is, a number with more zeros.
The same could be said of the mention of a cash payment made to Vice President María Jesús Montero’s chief of staff. In your case, 25,000 euros. We also mention meetings with Teresa Ribera, fashionable in right-wing debates, and with Begoña Gómez, whose presence is already constant in opposition complaints. All this is due to meetings on an empty Spain – this detail is nevertheless endearing – and we do not know what connection they may have with a corrupt plot.
Aldama’s biggest mistake was including a rather grotesque story about Venezuelan Vice President Delcy Rodríguez’s aborted visit to Spain in January 2020. According to her story, she arranged to find a cottage for Rodríguez to could stay there and organize a dinner to which not only Ábalos, but also Sánchez himself and four other members of the government were invited. Namely Marlaska, Montero, Illa and Ribera. With a few more assistants, you already have half a Council of Ministers.
The idea that Sánchez would honor with such a secret and well-attended dinner a foreign vice president who had been banned from visiting an EU country just one year after recognizing Juan Guaidó as president of Venezuela is so fantastic that it seems to have been written by the person who writes Feijóo’s speeches. And they planned to keep secret all the bodyguards who would be in the area and a delegation from the country whose government had suffered a stroke upon learning of Sánchez’s support for the opposition leader.
Another less credible element is Aldama’s statement that Koldo García told him that Marlaska had sent the CNI and the police “to check the house.” The Minister of the Interior has no authority over the CNI. Additionally, the police already have sufficient capabilities to examine the security of a chalet and check for hidden microphones or cameras. But including spies in the game always adds more mystery to the story.
It didn’t take long for the People’s Party to throw a party after Aldama’s revelations became known. Alberto Núñez Feijóo summoned journalists to Congress to show his indignation and propose to different parliamentary groups the typical proposal that they could reject. “I don’t have the votes to change the government – he said about a hypothetical motion of censure –, but if one of the partners wants to put an end to all this, I am available to open a new stage in our country” and “put an end to this agony.”
EH Bildu’s Jon Iñarritu responded on Twitter with a phrase and an emoji: “No sane person would go from ‘agony’ to hell. 😜”.
Feijóo’s sense of opportunity was once again evident. He presented this petition, doomed to failure, on the same day that the government managed to advance, not without problems, the tax package that had been stuck in its throat in recent weeks. The approval paves the way for new budgets. If he achieves them, he would in theory aspire to see the legislature through almost to the end.
The PP obviously wants Aldama to ensure that this is not possible. You will need a storyline with more electrifying moments and, if possible, evidence, for your next court appearance.
