The Supreme Court definitively rejected the lawsuit filed by Pablo Iglesias and Podemos against Eduardo Inda and the digital newspaper OkDiario for stating that they were financed with money from Venezuela and Iran and that they were a ” anti-democratic party. The journalist’s statements had, according to the civil judges, a “sufficient factual basis” to understand that he is protected by freedom of expression.
The party and the politician himself sued Inda and OkDiario for their comments in the Ana Rosa program in April 2021, in the middle of the electoral campaign for the Madrid elections in which Pablo Iglesias left the vice-presidency of the government to be a candidate for the Community of Madrid. That morning, Inda called Iglesias “scum”, assured that Podemos had been financed “by two dictatorships” in reference to Venezuela and Iran and described his actions as “crimes” and “anti-democratic atrocities “.
Some of this information, linked to party financing, was produced over the last decade on the basis of false or apocryphal documents, such as the PISA police report rejected by the Supreme Court.
Initially, Iglesias and Podemos obtained the support of the public prosecutor’s office, but the Madrid court and the provincial court of the capital rejected their request through civil proceedings. The courts highlighted the “context” of Inda’s statements, an electoral campaign in which Iglesias participated as a candidate for president of the Community of Madrid, also emphasizing that, according to their criteria, Inda was exercising his “response” to the ‘one of the party’s campaign videos where he was leaving. In this sense, the Madrid Court understood that Eduardo Inda had made his statements “in a television program, exposing his personal opinion in the exercise of his capacity as a commentator and in the use of his freedom of expression”.
The Supreme Court now rules definitively on the matter, finding that Eduardo Inda was protected by freedom of expression and that he violated neither the honor of Iglesias nor that of the party he then led. The judges explain that it is sufficient for the journalist’s comments to have “a sufficient factual basis”, without it being necessary to achieve “accuracy”. The collection in these two countries, the judges continue, “was not considered illegal”.
For the Supreme Court, everything that journalist Eduardo Inda said had “sufficient factual basis”. The “precursor” foundation of Podemos, they say, received “funds from Venezuela”, as well as “very important people within the said party”. They add that Iglesias himself “recognized” the “financing by Iran” by having assured during a conference that “these contradictions had to be overcome”. Regarding Iran, Iglesias was referring to a television show he had previously worked on, and not to Podemos’ political project.
