Anti-corruption prosecutor finalizes request for Jose Luis Abalosformer Minister of Transport, to be charged in the Koldo casein which the awarding of contracts for masks worth 54 million euros is being investigated, as learned by laSexta. Although, for the moment, the body is waiting to receive a report from the Central Operational Unit (UCO) of the Civil Guard, which will analyze all the material seized during the entries and searches carried out at the start of the operation.
The former Minister of Transport is increasingly stuck with a possible accusation that, of course, does not depend exclusively on the anti-corruption prosecutor’s office given his position as deputy and therefore authorized. The agency will make the request, but The Supreme Court will have to execute itwho has the power to do so.
This situation was caused by the evidence of the investigators that highlights the collaboration of José Luis Ábalos with the rest of the people involved and already identified in the case, in addition to the report prepared by the Ministry of Transport. In the aforementioned report of the ministry, now headed by Óscar Puente, the audit responsible for it highlights that The quantity of masks increased from 4 to 8 million units in 38 minutes while the first ministerial decree of March 20, 2020 had already been signed, designating Ábalos as responsible.
Even though the former minister has already assured that can “defend itself against everything”The sum of the reports and the audit of the Transport would lead the Anti-Corruption Prosecutor’s Office to ask the Supreme Court to indict Ábalos for the Koldo case.
An accusation that has already been requested this week. by the popular accusation of Iustitia Europa for the alleged commission of the crimes of prevarication, criminal organization, embezzlement of public funds, money laundering and administrative fraud for the management of masks, in which they claim that there is “rational and sufficient evidence” of the commission of these alleged crimes.
The reasons for the possible accusation of Ábalos
Although they have not yet given him his name and surname, investigators from the Central Operational Unit (UCO) of the Civil Guard consider that they are missing one piece: the name of the “super boss” it was at the head of the criminal organization who, presumably, had designed the rigging of all public markets investigated the proceedings in an attempt to distribute million-dollar commissions among its members.
A clue appears in the report that the UCO agents sent to the judge of the National Court Ismael Moreno on October 2, 2023, in which they indicated that the businessman Juan Carlos Cuetowho received more than nine million euros in commissions, according to the investigation, reported to Koldo Garcia from a meeting with another member of the plot, the intermediary Victor de Aldamain which he expressed concern about what he might get in response to a claim from the Tax Agency.
“The fact that Cueto went to Koldo after meeting Aldama, in the eyes of this instruction, would imply that he was in a higher decision-making level“, the agents write in this report, in which they then underline their conviction that There is a “super boss” of the organization it would be, organically, above Koldo Garcia and would have the final say in decision-making.
This deduction is based on the conversation of a worker from one of Aldama’s companies with Cueto in which she detailed the obstacles that Israel Pilar, another of the intermediaries of the operation, put in her work. “Don’t let Isra touch his balls because He has pictures of himself with the super boss. You already know who the super boss is in this story,” he added. And he clarified even more in another passage: “Even on Víctor’s WhatsApp there are photos of Israel Pilar that cannot be shown… with the minister“.
Participation in contracts
Another big unknown that researchers are trying to elucidate is who gave the order to award the contracts of masks investigated in the company Solutions de Gestion et Soutien aux Entreprises, owned by the Cueto Group, beyond the senior Transport officials indicated in the summary: the Secretary General of the State Ports, Alvaro Sanchez Manzanareswhom Koldo called “Alvarito” in intercepted conversations; and number three in the ministry, Jesus Manuel Gomez Garciacommon during meals organized by the councilor of Ábalos at seafood restaurant ‘La Chalana’ from Madrid.
The most important contract investigated in the Koldo case is the purchase of eight million masks that the state-owned company State Portsdependent on Transport, carried out on March 21, 2020, at the start of the state of alert declared to try to stop the coronavirus pandemic, for a total cost of 20 million eurosSix days later, the State’s legal advisory and port management services justified this sentence with an internal note included in the summary in which they invoked the “context of extreme urgency” of the moment and “the immediate respect of the what was ordered by the minister“.
On March 27, 2020, the railway director ADIF wins second contract by which he paid for the plot 12.5 million eurosalso for the supply of masks. In her statement to the Civil Guard, the former president of ADIF, Isabel Pardo de Vera, assured that “she has not received orders for the price, but she has received pressure from the Minister of Transport, [José Luis] Ábalos, and his office so that said allocation is carried out as quickly as possible”, so that “the availability of masks is as quick as possible”.Koldo was very insistent” he noted.
The summary also includes railway public works concessions worth six million euros to companies that allegedly made payments to Koldo’s wife García, as well as the award of a contract worth 14,999.8 euros to a company Ignacio Palomogynecologist of the Ábalos family – with whom he traveled to the Dominican Republic in 2021 – and the wife of his former advisor, Patricia Uriz.
Judge Ismael Moreno is also investigating another contract, worth 3.5 million euros, awarded by the Sub-Directorate General of Economic and Asset Management of the Home office for the purchase of medical equipment. The Director General of Coordination and Studies of the Secretary of State for Security, José Antonio Rodríguez, told the Civil Guard that the award came from the Ministry of Transport, although he could not say who specifically chose the supplier. “We accepted it because it seemed like a window of opportunity,” he explained during his interrogation.
The plot also won four awards for the purchase of masks granted by the Government of the Canary Islandsfor a total value of 12.3 million euros, and another of 3.7 million euros contributed by the Government of the Balearic Islands. As of June 2023, the five contracts are investigation by the European Public Prosecutor’s Office having been paid with European funds.
Ministerial documents and payments of private expenses
The delivery of the Ministry of Transport papers to José Luis Ábalos, detailed in the summary, constitutes the strangest episode of the case. On November 2, 2023, the undersecretary of the ministry, Jesús Manuel Gómez García, He gave Koldo Garcia an envelope containing documents at the restaurant ‘La Chalana’. According to the version he himself gave to the Civil Guard investigators, this envelope contained a report from the Court of Auditors and another from the General Intervention of the State related to the investigated contracts that the minister needed to file a complaint against a journalist. The envelope was recovered by Koldo García’s brother, who personally took it to Ábalos, at his home in Valencia, after undertaking a trip in a van during which his vehicle was searched by armed agents of the institute, who let him go.
The president of the Zamora Football Club, Víctor de Aldama, also exchanged several references that seem to point to Ábalos in a WhatsApp chat titled “the four musketeers”, in which they spoke openly cash deliveriesin some cases “for whores”, and, between words of satisfaction, photographs of bundles of invoices and delivery notes were sent. Regarding a possible sale of medical equipment, the members of the chat went so far as to emphasize that “the minister will give his approval” and that this matter “can only be stopped by Health”. They also discussed the need to prepare a “negative report”, possibly referring to a COVID-19 testWhen asked who would be the beneficiary, one of the participants answered without a doubt: “José Luis Ábalos.”
The summary also includes Payments Patricia Urizwife of Koldo Garcia, in Ábalos worth 26,274.05 euros and three transfers that she allegedly made between 2018 and 2019 to the ex-wife of the minister Carolina Perles, worth 2,512.80 euros. The former advisor also paid expenses to his former boss during trips made since 2019, sometimes with their families, to Mexico, Colombia, the United Arab Emirates, Peru, Romania, Russia and Canada.
