One of the first emergency contracts of Carlos Mazón’s government after the DANA disaster was awarded to the company in which his chief of staff and regional communications secretary, José Manuel Cuenca, worked for five years. Councilor Nuria Montes, known for her inappropriate statements about the relatives of the victims of DANA, signed the order to the company STV Gestión SL for one of the four lots of the emergency contract for the cleaning service of roads and entrances to industrial zones affected by the disaster of October 29. The prize amount is 290,000 euros.
José Manuel Cuenca was responsible for the Communication and Institutional Relations department of STV Gestión SL between November 2017 and January 2023, when he joined it as advisor to the popular parliamentary group of Corts Valencianes, then as a senior official of the Executive of Mazón, as indicated your official CV of the regional transparency portal GVA Oberta.
Cuenca is one of the people closest to President Mazón within the presidential “politburo”. The regional secretary and chief of staff of the head of the Consell has not been separated from Carlos Mazón since the day after the catastrophic DANA. At key times on October 29, as published The objectiveCuenca was outside the Palau de la Generalitat to attend to a “special” matter in Xàtiva, located 60 kilometers from the Valencian capital.
The company STV Gestión SL, with numerous public contracts in Murcia and, to a lesser extent, the Provincial Delegation of Alicante, has assets of 76 million euros, according to its latest annual accounts, corresponding to the financial year 2023, deposited in the Register. . Trade.
The company’s former head of communications and institutional relations is currently Mazón’s right-hand man at the Palau de la Generalitat. Throughout the DANA crisis, Cuenca did not separate from his boss, like other senior officials of the presidency who constitute the hard core of the Valencian executive, such as Santiago Lumbreras (former chief of staff of Mazón to the Provincial Council of Alicante) or Cayetano García Ramírez.
Carlos Mazón’s entire communication strategy depends on José Manuel Cuenca. The president’s chief of staff was professionally linked to the Cope network until 2017, when he joined STV Gestión SL. After a brief period as advisor to the Popular Parliamentary Group, between February and July 2023, after the last regional elections, Cuenca landed at the Palau de la Generalitat. The senior official maintains friendly relations with Carlos Mazón to the point that they both share a house in Valencia.
“Essential and urgent” cleaning of polygons
The emergency contract, through an award negotiated without advertising, justifies the call for tenders due to the cessation of activity in the industrial zones of the Horta Sud region after the passage of the DANA, “it is therefore essential and urgent to “clean and free the obstacles that prevent access to businesses and industrial warehouses.
The award was awarded by the Valencian Institute of Competitiveness and Innovation (Ivace), chaired by councilor Nuria Montes. The head of the regional portfolio of Industry states in the documentation consulted by elDiario.es that the works must be carried out by companies “capable of carrying out the services optimally and with the greatest speed and efficiency”. Thus, among the companies that “have given consent for the provision of services” is, for the second batch, STV Gestión SL.
“Every day of delay in access to industrial facilities represents considerable economic losses,” states the resolution that declares and treats the contract as emergency, signed by Montes. STV Gestión SL obtained the second lot, related to the cleaning of roads and accesses to the industrial areas of Albal, Beniparrell, Catarroja and Massanassa.
The resolution signed by Nuria Montes warns that the distribution of polygons allocated to each lot “may be modified in accordance with the indications and instructions” of Ivace “in order to accelerate the completion of the tasks as quickly as possible”.
Although an execution time is estimated at one month, Councilor Montes also indicates that the total time “will vary depending on the extension and the existing situation in each polygon”, a deadline “impossible to determine with precision” .
It is the only company to win this contract, worth a total of 1.1 million euros, that is not domiciled in the province of Valencia. The fourth lot was awarded, also for 290,400 euros, to Pavasal (a construction company which, according to the judgment of the “Taula affair” on box B of the Valencia PP, contributed a total of 240,000 euros to the campaign election of the Popular Party in the municipal elections of 2007).
The first lot was awarded to GD Energy Services SAU (based in Paterna) and the third to Magma Gestións SLU, a demolition company from Massalfassar.
The industry defends that Cuenca “has nothing to do with it”
The presidency of the Generalitat Valenciana did not respond to this newspaper’s questions.
The Ministry of Industry, for its part, assures that Mazón’s chief of staff “has nothing to do” with this award.
Sources from the department headed by Nuria Montes affirm that Ivace asked the companies for “immediate availability” of trucks and emphasize that technical assistance was also granted for the supervision of the execution of the cleaning service of the polygon (for a total value of 76,230 euros). The engineering company MS Ingenieros SLU will be responsible for auditing the work of STV Gestión.
