The former president of Plus Ultra Julio Martínez Sola has confirmed today, as he had already anticipated in writing, that he agreed with the Zapatero group the payment of a 1% commission in case of success for the aid so that the Government would grant the airline a bailout of 53 million euros.
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According to sources present at the interrogation, this Zapatero group he mentioned refers to the former Prime Minister José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero and his friend and partner Julio Martínez Martínez.
In fact, the investigated himself, who had to resign in July after acknowledging these payments through a written statement, indicated that when Martínez proposed the payment, “without a doubt” they knew its destination was the former Prime Minister.
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He explained that the company was looking for support so that they would approach the Government and promote the granting of the bailout after the pandemic, which was finally granted in 2021. It was then the main shareholder of the company Rodolfo Reyes who came up with the idea to approach Zapatero.
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The next episode that Martínez Sola recounts is that it was the former socialist leader himself who contacted him through a call from a hidden number, offered help, and told him that from that moment on another person, Julio Martínez Martínez, would contact him, as it happened. From that moment on, the payment of 1% was decided, which would be delivered in different payments until reaching 500,000 euros.
The former president of Plus Ultra has also acknowledged that in the agreement of those payments they were justified as consulting work. The investigated framed the payment, to the judge’s astonishment, as payments for accompaniment, although he admitted that the reports provided by Martínez’s company, Análisis Relevante, were worthless and were just a cover to pay the bailout.
However, Martínez Sola has not been able to clarify what kind of arrangements the former president could have made. He did not have that information but, just in case, he paid.
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