With that characteristic slyness, Mariano Rajoy once said about the party’s slush fund he presided over: “We knew everything, except what appeared in the newspapers.” The Gürtel case politically brought down the leader of the PP, but he has never had to assume judicial responsibility for the illegal financing network that operated for years within the PP and provided undeclared bonuses to a large part of its leaders and served to pay for the renovation of the party’s headquarters on Génova street in Madrid, as well as numerous electoral events and to enrich some necessary intermediaries, such as the party’s own treasurer, Luis Bárcenas. Several judges have investigated this case and its derivatives, but Rajoy has not been accused of anything in these years. Today he will testify again before the Audiencia Nacional. It is necessary to review, now with perspective, what has happened so that M. Rajoy’s involvement has not gone further and is only fodder for talk shows or social media memes. We are going to divide one of the most relevant corruption cases of recent decades in Spain into three phases:

“I will answer everything I am asked.” Although the president of the court judging Operation Kitchen warned her that she had been provisionally cleared, meaning any false answer could serve to reopen the case against her, the former secretary general of the Popular Party arrived this Thursday at the Audiencia Nacional eager to distance herself from any parapolice operation to steal information from Luis Bárcenas because at that time she “was certain” that “that person you are talking about” (referring to the former treasurer) did not have any document that could compromise the Popular Party leadership over its irregular financing. Words that could contradict a recording that was made public in which she asked former commissioner José Manuel Villarejo:

As expected, Mariano Rajoy has denied the main accusations made by former PP treasurer Luis Bárcenas about his knowledge of an illegal slush fund within the party or about a supposed operation orchestrated by the Popular Party, the Government, or the Police to steal data that could criminally affect him. In fact, for the former president of the government, there was no illegal operation.