“This can only be unlocked from Catalonia,” Alberto Núñez Feijóo told Josep Sánchez-Llibre, the president of the large Catalan employers’ association Foment del Treball, after his speech at the annual conferences of the Cercle d’Economia. That phrase, directed at whom it was directed, was full of intent. Sánchez-Llibre is one of the few representatives of Catalan civil society with notable interlocution and capacity for influence over the leader of Junts, Carles Puigdemont. So Feijóo was seeking help to convince the former president of the convenience of favoring a no-confidence motion that would unseat Pedro Sánchez. Both the socialist and the popular leader sent messages to Waterloo, but in very different tones and content. Junts has made it clear from the beginning that their votes are in exchange for demands, so it’s about knowing what Sánchez and Feijóo offer to potential allies. Well, both have made it quite clear this week in Barcelona.

David Sánchez’s statement this morning at the Badajoz Court has surprised due to its brevity and its complete lack of references to his hiring as coordinator of conservatories at the Badajoz Provincial Council in 2017. David Sánchez only answered his lawyer’s questions, which were limited to two issues: his change of position in 2022 when he became director of the Office of Performing Arts, and the hiring in 2023, also by the Badajoz Provincial Council, of his friend Luis Carrero as coordinator of cross-border centers and activities.

Leire Díez was appointed in April 2024, by order of the then PSOE organization secretary, Santos Cerdán, to initiate a series of actions to save the PSOE and Pedro Sánchez’s circle from the legal cases that threatened them and to dig up dirt on their political rivals. Now, the Audiencia Nacional has uncovered these dealings and found a large amount of audio material because Díez recorded those clandestine meetings, where she offered agreements with the Prosecutor’s Office and claimed to be the emissary of the PSOE and the Government to “put themselves on the right side of history.”

The operational central unit (UCO) of the Civil Guard points to its own director general, Mercedes González, as one of the ways that Leire Díez’s plot would have to torpedo uncomfortable investigations for the environment of President Pedro Sánchez. The file, to which La Vanguardia has had access, reveals that the PSOE “plumber” met, at least, on three occasions with González, whom she urged to initiate an internal investigation in the UCO – for alleged leaks – to intimidate the high command. Just a week ago, the Minister of the Interior, Fernando Grande-Marlaska, stood up for the highest official of the armed institute, assuring that “he had not had any meeting with Leire Díez in terms of any kind.”

The alleged “plumbing” scheme would have started with a clear directive and an “ultimate goal”: “to protect the interests at stake” of the socialist party and, directly or indirectly, of the Prime Minister, Pedro Sánchez. The mastermind would be Santos Cerdán, then the strongman of the president, and it all began when his wife, Begoña Gómez, was charged. What can be inferred from the reports of the Central Operative Unit (UCO) of the Civil Guard included in the case file, which La Vanguardia has accessed, is that Cerdán already had other dangerous connections prior to that April 2024 with Leire Díez and the former president of SEPI Vicente Fernández. In fact, they are being investigated by the National Court for rigging public contracts.

The Central Operative Unit (UCO) of the Civil Guard has come this morning, by order of the National Court, to search the headquarters of Tubos Reunidos, one of the companies rescued during the pandemic by the State Industrial Holdings Company (SEPI), just like Plus Ultra.