First resignation in Ceuta since the irregular entry of immigrants on July 29. And among the reasons is not the management of the crisis, but an alleged discrepancy of versions about the warnings of the avalanche at the border. The chief of staff of the Government delegate in the autonomous city, Gonzalo Sanz, has submitted his resignation through a letter in which he assures that the warning that an agent of the National Intelligence Center (CNI) transmitted to him via WhatsApp the day before the massive crossing was indeed passed on to the delegate himself, Miguel Ángel Pérez Triano, who denied to the media having been aware of these communications.
The resignation letter comes after the magistrate of the National Court María Tardón requested the declassified documentation by the Government to incorporate it into the criminal case on the Ceuta crisis. Among the papers that came to light on Wednesday was a conversation on July 29, in which the CNI transmitted to the Government Delegation that on social networks there was “a call” for an “assault” by fence and sea on July 30 taking advantage of the Throne Festival in Morocco. According to reports, this call was being cooked up in two different Facebook groups, with a total of 180,000 followers. “To give you an idea of the reach of the dissemination,” commented the CNI. That same day, at 21:34h, an 11-minute conversation took place.
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The Government delegate claims ignorance of the conversations and refuses to resign
Pérez Triano, who called the media after the declassification, placed all responsibility on his chief of staff, who now resigns, becoming the first official to take responsibility. According to the Government delegate, Sanz did not inform him of either the messages or the call. When asked by the press, he also stated that he had no knowledge of what was discussed in the 11-minute phone call. Yesterday, a meeting was held at the Government Delegation in which Sanz was pressured to resign, despite the chief of staff maintaining that he did pass on the CNI warnings. The Government Delegation has confirmed that Pérez Triano asked for his chief of staff’s head.
In the resignation letter, previewed by Ceuta al Día, Sanz announces that he resigns from the position “for personal and family reasons.” However, he insists that “the written messaging information transmitted by the CNI on July 29 was transmitted” by him “to the delegate himself that same day,” something that does not match the different statements of Pérez Triano, who claims not to have received information from him. That said, he says he makes the decision “without the slightest acrimony towards the delegate because I know that the Government Delegation has worked tirelessly to achieve actions by the central Government from the first minute, aware that there are reports that demonstrate the warning and alert work carried out from the Government Delegation towards the different ministries and hoping that our Ceuta recovers as soon as possible the normality we so much need.”
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After the resignation letter became known, the Government Delegation issued a statement referring to the statements made by Pérez Triano at the press conference, where he assured that he had no knowledge, before July 30, of either the content of the WhatsApp message exchanged between the chief of staff and a member of the CNI, nor of the existence or content of the phone call held between them.
The Government Delegation reiterates that said message referred to movements detected on social networks promoting an irregular entry into Ceuta coinciding with the Throne Festival, providing as the only data the number of followers of those groups. “The CNI did not at any time estimate the number of people who would actually mobilize, nor did it assess the likelihood that the call would materialize; its communication was limited to describing the size of the mentioned groups,” the statement reads.
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