“I am not here as president of Congress,” Francina Armengol was quick to clarify this Monday at the beginning of her appearance before the commission of that same House that investigates the purchases of masks in the pandemic. It was the first time that a person who holds the third authority of the State was subjected to a similar interrogation, in the case of the socialist Armengol in her capacity as former president of the Balearic Islands, a community that bought a batch of masks worth 3.7 million. to the company sponsored by the former advisor to the Ministry of Transportation Koldo García, accused of charging illegal commissions for it. The president of Congress admitted having maintained some contact with García, but she assured that she would never talk about purchasing masks.
Subject to incessant fire from the PP since the case broke out, Armengol had appeared on March 5 to give explanations to the press about the relations of her former Government with the company Soluciones de Gestión, the axis of the allegedly corrupt plot and that supplied masks of lower quality than agreed upon. Then the president of Congress left a question unresolved: who had recommended that company to her Executive in the spring of 2020.
The matter was clarified this Monday before Armengol appeared. One of the witnesses who preceded him before the commission was the former director general of Health of his Government Manuel Palomino, who reported that in April 2020 he received a call from the Ministry of Development switchboard from a person he does not remember, who asked him if He wanted to participate in a “massive, voluminous, important” purchase of masks and gave him contact with Koldo García. Both he and later the then Minister of Economy and Tourism, Iago Negueruela, and Armengol herself explained that they urgently needed this material for civil use in order to begin the de-escalation as soon as possible and not ruin the summer tourist season. Palomino added that he communicated with García via WhatsApp and he provided him with the contact information for Management Solutions.
Armengol was healthy even before the questions began and commented: “I want to be honest. I have had some contact with Mr. García, he was an advisor to the Minister of Transport and I cannot remember what I spoke with him. What I can say with complete clarity is that I never spoke to that man about contracts with any company, because I have never done so with anyone.”
She would repeat it several times throughout the appearance before the deputies’ questions and with increasing emphasis: “I have been president of the Consell de Mallorca for four years and president of the Balearic Islands for eight years and I have never, ever given an order to anyone to “to hire a specific company.” She even emphasized it before the parliamentarian of Més, integrated in Sumar, Vicenç Vidal, who was a member of her Government: “You have been my advisor, you know it perfectly.” Armengol argued that no president is aware of the administrative files of each contract and stated that the person in this case has now studied it to be able to give explanations to the commission. She even resorted to her status as a professional pharmacist to justify her remaining aloof from those matters.
The appearance of the third authority of the State had been preceded by a tense confrontation, at times shouting, between the PP deputy José Vicente Marí Bosó and the former councilor Negueruela. Without going that far, there were also very harsh moments with the questions to Armengol from the popular Elías Bendodo and the Vox member Jorge Campos. Both repeatedly accused her of lying, of “discrediting” her position and of acting as “guarantor of a corrupt plot.” Bendodo went so far as to directly accuse her of a crime of malfeasance and even assured that if it were not for her arrest she would now be under investigation, when none of the officials in her Government who made the decisions on the case have been the subject of accusations by the judicial body that processes it. the National Court.
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Faced with Campos’s insinuations, the socialist leader revolted: “I am not involved in any case of corruption, I deeply hate political corruption, I have been fighting against that scourge for many years.” The Vox representative also joked that Armengol had confessed her sadness during the worst moments of the pandemic and she retorted again: “Well, I did cry, I shed a lot of tears, it was the worst time of my life.”
The deputies asked him in particular about two issues: the three-year delay in demanding a refund of 2.6 million from the company once it was found that the masks were not FFP2, as had been promised, and that, after discovering this non-compliance , its Administration signs a certificate stating the normal receipt of the material. Regarding the first, both Armengol and Negueruela previously alluded to the collapse of the Administration due to the pandemic and indicated that they had four years to do so. And the two accused the current Balearic PP Government of letting the company’s claim lapse, a matter for which the socialists have filed a complaint in a court in Palma. As for the certificate, they detracted from its value, maintaining that it was a mere recognition that the merchandise had been received and not an endorsement of the company, as PP and Vox denounced.
Vidal, from Més, and Francesc-Marc Álvaro, from ERC, avoided direct accusations. The latter even warned from the outset that he did not doubt the word of the president of Congress and that the only thing he intended was to determine her possible political responsibility. But neither of them stopped delving into aspects of the case that they considered unclear. When asked by both, Armengol stated that no official informed him that in July 2022 Civil Guard agents had gone to the Health Department to claim the file.
Armengol did not hold back from accusing the PP of “constructing a false story” and attacking her solely because of her status as president of Congress. And she ended with a call: “I ask to stop this way of doing politics. For the good of the institutions, of democracy and of this country.”
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