The commission agent Víctor de Aldama denied this Thursday before the judge of the National Court Ismael Moreno that neither Francina Armengol, current president of the Congress of Deputies, in her time as president of the Balearic Islands, nor anyone from her government asked for or received commissions for the contract that was awarded to his company, Soluciones de Gestión, for the acquisition of medical material during the pandemic.
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According to sources present at the interrogation, in his statement as an investigated person before the instructor he maintained that the contact with Armengol was Koldo García, advisor to the then Minister of Transport José Luis Ábalos.
Aldama, like García and Ábalos, are awaiting the sentence to be issued by the Supreme Court for the commissions paid by the businessman to the former minister and his right-hand man. However, several cases are being investigated in the National Court for other irregularities.
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In one of them, the contracts to Soluciones de Gestión by the Balearic Government and by the Canary Islands Government when it was presided over by Víctor Ángel Torres, current Minister of Territorial Policy and Democratic Memory, are being investigated.
Aldama has explained that the situation of Armengol and Torres is different. “While I keep insisting that Torres asked for money and bribes, it is not known that anyone from the Balearic administration asked for money,” he indicated.
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During the last year, this businessman has been acknowledging the payment of bribes to Koldo García and Ábalos, as well as to other senior officials, in exchange for contracts. Today he again insisted that he paid the advisor 10,000 euros to facilitate contracts and open doors to other administrations.
Aldama’s statement comes after the central operational unit (UCO) of the Civil Guard delivered a report to the court stating that the contracts for medical material “will constitute part of the reason for the monthly payment of 10,000 euros in cash that Víctor de Aldama had been paying to Koldo,” a relationship that allowed the businessman, according to the investigators, “to have access” to the former minister.
Furthermore, the report stated that this “economic relationship” was maintained up to eight months after Ábalos and Koldo García were dismissed from the Ministry of Transport in July 2021, so “this pattern” of payments by Aldama would not be limited “to specific actions” but “to ensuring his capacity of influence” to obtain “an economic profit.”
