The investigating magistrate maintains the evidence of criminality but refuses to impose precautionary measures on the first president of democracy prosecuted for corruption.
The horribilis week that the Psoe reached its climax this Wednesday, after its former secretary general between 2000 and 2012, José Luis Rodríguez Zapaterobecame the first president of the Government since the recovery of democracy prosecuted for corruption to testify in court.
He did so before the investigating judge of the National Court José Luis Calama, during a long statement of more than three hours.
Its prolonged duration did not help the magistrate to reconsider the evidence that incriminates the former socialist leader. Despite this, he refused to dictate precautionary measures such as the withdrawal of the passport, which the Anti-Corruption Prosecutor’s Office and popular accusations requested.
According to Calama, the visibility of Shoemaker, His roots in Spain and “the absence of any indication of evasive intention” dispel any possibility of “real and current” escape.
He also sees no risk of concealment or destruction of evidence, since “the relevant elements of the case have already been intervened,” he added. In his order, he made it clear that “the statement of the person under investigation has not been able to distort the rational evidence of criminality set forth in the indictment.”
Movements and calendar
The car of Calama It showed that several of the big questions in the case remain open. Firstly, the “traceability of various transfers” and that they coincide in time.
This is the rescue of Plus Ultra by the State Industrial Participation Company (Sepi) in 2021 and which cost 53 million euros (US$60 million), the payments made by the airline to the consultancy Analysis Relevant, and those of the latter to Rodriguez Zapatero and the advertising agency of his two daughters.
In his statement, Rodriguez Zapatero He defended his activity as a consultant for Relevant Analysis, a firm headed by one of his most faithful collaborators.
He said it after Economic and Fiscal Crime Unit, Udef, of the National Police appreciated that these businesses concealed payments linked to influence peddling.
At this point, Calama He stated in his order that he maintains his doubts about “the use of multiple commercial companies that are indicatively instrumental” to channel commissions.
The jewels
Rodriguez Zapatero He denied having committed influence peddling. He also chose not to testify when the magistrate asked him about the origin of the jewelry that the National Police located in a safe located in his office. At first, the former president attributed these assets valued at 1.3 million euros (US$ 1.4 million) to a family inheritance.
Yesterday, it did not prove “its origin or its corresponding tax and customs settlement,” he said. Calama in his writing. The former leader of Psoe will have a new opportunity to address this issue. Within a period of between a week and ten days, he must appear again, within the framework of the separate piece focused on the jewelry.
The key device
In addition to all this battery of “indications” that the investigating judge continues to appreciate after the statement, Calama made a direct reference in his writing to a key piece of evidence in the investigation: the messages contained on the cell phone of Rodolfo Reyes. He is the main shareholder of the rescued airline and a citizen of Venezuela, whose previous Government led by Nicolas Maduro kept with Rodriguez Zapatero an intense relationship.
The device in question was cloned by the United States in 2021. In several conversations it contained, Reyes assured that Rodríguez Zapatero is in charge “here”, regarding the rescue of Plus Ultra. He defined the socialist as his “contact” and his “friend” – synonymous with companion.
Calama’s direct reference in his car to what the device contained comes after the defense of the former president to request its annulment as evidence.
Reaction of Zapatero and the Psoe
After leaving the National Court, José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero issued a statement in which he assured that he had “always” acted with “honesty.” Given the eleven “very serious” crimes attributed to him in the two cases he has open, he urged citizens to trust him, since “the truth will make its way.”
He Psoe He closed ranks with his former secretary general and rejected “parallel trials and early convictions.” Zapatero took advantage of his summons to deliver a “voluntary universal authorization” to the magistrate.
This is a power that grants the investigator of the case to inspect in any jurisdiction in the world that does not own companies, funds, assets or financial products. “I have absolutely nothing outside of Spain,” he stressed before Calama.
Other judicial fronts
Waiting to see how the instruction concludes when it ends, the image from this Wednesday of Rodriguez Zapatero entering and leaving the National Court means for the Psoe another hard blow.
The party has other cases open in court, such as those related to business and judicial pressures allegedly orchestrated by Lebire Díez, better known as the plumber.
Another is the one that put the former Minister of Transport and former Secretary of Organization on the bench, José Luis Ábaloswhose ruling the Supreme Court plans to make public in the coming days.
