This was the beginning of the political journey in the Galician Parliament: the creation of a commission of inquiry into the Xunta’s contracts, especially those that resulted in an additional cost of 470 million for the construction of the main hospital in Vigo and those formalized with Eulen, of which Alberto Núñez Feijóo’s sister, Micaela Núñez Feijóo, is the director of the northwest zone. But the PP tried to avoid focusing on the management of the current leader of the Spanish PP in the Xunta and voted against it. It has an absolute majority and its refusal is enough to make this first attempt fail, but the BNG announced that it would force the creation of a parliamentary commission. The regulation allows it thanks to a point that establishes that it can be created automatically at the request of a third of the deputies belonging to the same parliamentary group. The nationalist party holds exactly a third of the seats in the Chamber.
In her argument in this first attempt to create the commission, promoted by the BNG, its leader, Ana Pontón, asked for “democracy and transparency” to analyze the case of Álvaro Cunqueiro and that of Eulen – 54 million contracts in the last 15 years -, but also the emergency contracts during the pandemic, especially with the companies Universal Support – for which the brother of Feijóo’s partner works -, Sibucu 360 – which bought masks with false certificates – and Mape Asesores – a company that provided a commission of two million euros to Ayuso’s partner.
He was supported by the PSdeG and Democracia Ourensana. The socialist Elena Espinosa considered that the Galicians should know the truth about these operations and that the Xunta “cannot normalize the preferential treatment given to companies linked to the Feijóo family circle.” Regarding the Vigo hospital, he said that the PP’s decision sought to “benefit a foreign investment fund.” The only member of the mixed group, Armando Ojea, asked to analyze the procedures, without, however, accusing, in principle, the PP of anything, he said.
To explain the PP’s refusal, its spokesman, Alberto Pazos Couñago, came to the podium of Parliament, which began his intervention with Venezuela: “They intend to import the methodology of the Maduro regime into our country.” The intention of the BNG, he said, is to “spread fake news in the hope of covering up his electoral failure. He assured that there was no favorable treatment for Eulen, that the PSdeG and BNG bipartisan that governed the Xunta from 2005 to 2009 also analyzed the possibility of a public-private collaboration for the Vigo hospital and that “100%” of the Pandemic contracts were supervised by the Consello de Contas. He then clarified that “Contas decided to audit only a part, but 100% was made available.”
Pontón replied ironically: “Since you are making hoaxes, improve them a little.” He accused the PP of lacking truth and said that “their lies have no basis.” The bipartisan, he replied, commissioned a study on alternatives to build the Álvaro Cunqueiro hospital, including a public-private collaboration. But he ruled out this option and the project that Feijóo inherited when he joined the Xunta in 2009 was that of a construction with public funds. The BNG leader referred to the Contas report on the Vigo hospital which concluded that the formula chosen by the PP represented an additional cost of 470 million euros: “Read the reports. This week we discovered that they are not read.
The nationalist spokesman assured that, given the PP’s refusal to create the investigation commission, the BNG will activate this other possibility of promotion alone and asked the popular party “not to veto” the work and to allow Parliament to request “all the necessary documentation and appearances.
