Pressure mounts on Sánchez over pandemic corruption scandal involving former minister

Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez is under pressure from the opposition to remove former Transport Minister José Luis Ábalos from his position as MP over suspicions that he knew about a €50 million corruption scandal involving the purchase of masks during the pandemic, demanding he shed light on the case in parliament.

The corruption scandal in question is known as the Koldo case, which refers to Koldo García, a former advisor to Ábalos who, as part of a corruption network involving several businessmen and civil servants, collected more than €50 million in bribes from the government for the “mediation and purchase” of masks at the height of the pandemic, Euractiv’s partner EFE reported.

According to investigators, after receiving government contracts to supply masks to the health authorities, Koldo García tried to “hide these charges” and avoid the traceability of the money.

García was a man whom Ábalos trusted, El País reported. He was an adviser to the former minister, an adviser to the state railway company (RENFE) and a member of the board of directors of the public body Puertos del Estado (state ports administration) between 2018 and 2021, among other positions.

A few hours after the scandal broke, the government responded with a strong condemnation of any form of corruption.

Speaking at a meeting of the Socialist International in Madrid on Saturday, Sánchez reiterated the full commitment of the coalition executive – the PSOE and the left-wing Sumar platform – to fight corruption “wherever it comes from and whoever falls into it”, pointing out that “whoever does it pays”, in an indirect reference to the Koldo case.

Ábalos was dismissed from his post as transport minister by Sánchez in July 2021. Following the outbreak of the scandal, numerous analysts and several right-wing and conservative media outlets questioned what was behind the decision over the weekend.

Avoid damaging the PSOE’s ‘clean’ image

“Against those who protected corruption (in the PM’s view, Spain’s People’s Party; Partido Popular/EPP), today there is full cooperation with justice to see it through to the end. What goes around comes around, that’s how it’s going to continue”, Sánchez said on Saturday.

Meanwhile, the president of the Castilla-La Mancha region (Centre-South), Emiliano García-Page, called for the “image of cleanliness” of the government and the Socialist Party to be preserved and urged Sánchez to react “in proportion to the damage” that the “Koldo case” could do to the progressive party, although he did not explicitly call for the former minister’s resignation.

No one in the government has yet made a clear public statement on the scandal, and only two ministers, Finance Minister María Jesús Montero and Defence Minister Margarita Robles, both from the PSOE, have spoken out.

“I know what I would do, I can’t say what Mr Ábalos wants to do or stop doing, I know what I would do,” said Montero.

“Everyone has to know what they have to do at any given moment”, Robles said.

The Partido Popular, the main opposition force in parliament, and the far-right Vox party, the third force in parliament, are demanding that Ábalos resign and that all the light be shed on the case, which has rocked the Spanish political scene and scandalised public opinion since last week.

The PP’s secretary general, Cuca Gamarra, has called for the former minister’s resignation as a deputy, asserting that Sánchez is also implicated in the scandal because, according to her, the prime minister knew about the corruption plot when he sacked Ábalos in July 2021.

“It’s not possible for him (Ábalos) to remain a minute longer as a representative of all Spaniards (as MP)”, said Gamarra, adding that Sánchez “must give explanations as to why he dismissed Ábalos and why knowing what he surely already knew” he did not report the case to the courts.

Ábalos defended his innocence in the case this weekend, admitting that if the scandal had occurred when he was a minister, he would have had to “resign at the time”, whereas now, in his position as a member of parliament, he has “no responsibility”.

(Fernando Heller | EuroEFE.Euractiv.es)