The works of acting by the UCO compromise several remittances of European funds | National and international economy

The perplexity that was expressed From the construction company Acciona On Thursday, when the report of the Central Operating Unit (UCO) of the Civil Guard that points to the company for The alleged payment of bites in exchange for public works contractsit is the same that say they feel high positions of the Ministry of Transportation. The five projects that have been under the police magnifying glass, granted between 2018 and 2021, with José Luis Ábalos at the head of the public works department, added more than 500 million euros and the UCO has collected indications on the distribution of 620,000 euros by ACCIONA and fertilizers without performing for another 450,000 euros. The alleged bribed were the former Minister Ábalos and who acted as his right in Transport, advisor Koldo García. All with the intermediation of what has been ORGANIZATION SECRETARY AND PSOE Deputy, Santos Cerdánand the participation of the then Director of Actiona Construcción in La Rioja y Navarra, Fernando Merino Vera.

The case, explain legal sources, has signs of climbing to Brussels. In the investigated competitions, promoted by ADIF and the General Directorate of Roads, there are a series of coincidences: they were opened to the concurrence of other companies; In all there were numerous offers; Actiona won the processes comfortably for the technical score, among praise that left the different hiring tables in writing, and they were projects co -financed by European funds.

This last circumstance opens the possibility of an ex officio investigation within the EU. The European Prosecutor’s Office and the European Office to Fight Fraud already act on part of the Koldo case for fraud in the purchase of masks, financed in part with community money. They do so in surveillance of the EU budget, which is where the European Regional Development Funds (FEDER) come from that are behind some of the works that act could have been awarded in fraud.

The support of the EU, with the aforementioned FEDER funds through the Plurirregional Operational Program of Spain 2014-2020 and the 2021-2027, maintains part of the underground budget of the rail arterial network in Murcia, which ACCIONA won in alliance with Ferrovial for 159 million euros. The Feders also appear in the execution of the meditating corridor platform in the Pulpí-Vera section, confident again to the tandem actua-ferrovial for 121 million. And they are Next Generation funds that pay part of the works for the integration of the railroad in Sant Feliu de Llobregat (Barcelona), which Actiona took solo for 51.7 million despite being ninth with its economic offer, once it won over the technique.

If an investigation is opened by the European Prosecutor’s Office, explains a lawyer with a long experience in community law and put in Parliament, European justice would have exclusivity on the piece and the case could end sentences to the intervenings in case of corruption, not in an infraction to the Member State. The procedure against Spain would be opened « if the European Commission understands that a structural problem is given because the necessary mechanisms have been launched to stand up to corruption. The appeal to the EU Court of Justice would be an extraordinary case, » explains the expert.

ACCIONA has announced internal investigation into these rail works, whose award was signed by Isabel Pardo de Vera as president of Adifof whom the UCO contributes compromising communications with Koldo García on the contracts. The three projects are added to the construction of the surrounding section-Navarrete of the A-68 highway, in La Rioja (92.4 million), and the construction of the braces of the Sevillian bridge of the Centenary (102.8 million euros).

In the dome of the Ministry of Transport, there are internal sources, there was a debate on Thursday on whether it is pertinent, or not, the opening of an audit on public works tender during the stage of José Luis Ábalos, from June 2018 to July 2021. The decision, late on Friday, was to offer “all collaboration to justice and not open an audit such as the one that was undertaken on the contracts of the masks”.

That internal prospecting on the methods of contracting health material with urgency He was seen by the PSOE as a witch hunt by Minister Óscar Puente against Ábalos. An extreme that is tried to avoid in regards to another secretary of Organization of the Party, such as Santos Cerdán. Puente, in any case, has admitted in his account in the social network X that « the disappointment is very large » in the indications of corruption that corner the Navarrese politician and that the president of the Government, Pedro Sánchez, described the Thursday as « very serious. »

The Merino manager

Once seen that the president of Actiona, José Manuel Entrecanales, appears in the UCO report for a meeting with Ábalos on July 30, 2018, that the researchers circumscribe to “a first reciprocal knowledge, the result of the new journey (by José Luis Ábalos) within the mitma (Ministry of Transportation)”, from the company it is confirmed that it was nothing more than a protocol meeting. On the appearance of the businessman’s last name on an note on the agenda of Koldo García on communication between the two, he denies that there was any conversation. Civil Guard agents have claimed the company in recent days the communications of the former director involved in the supposed plot of public contracts, Fernando Merino, and the documentation related to the five works that appear in the UCO report.

Merino was fired in April 2021 and construction sources comment that it was due to « a loss of confidence that is not linked to the case of the alleged relationship with Koldo and Cerdán. » It was not until two years later, in March 2023, when Actiona registered in the Mercantile Registry the revocation of Merino as proxy of Actiona Construcción, which is explained as a mere procedure by asserting the aforementioned date of opening of 2021 as that of the separation.

A few days before the rupture of Acciona with his boss in La Rioja and Navarra, on February 26 of that 2021, Minister Ábalos himself appeared in one of the allegedly rigged works for the group of entrecanals: the construction of the highway section between the municipalities of Arrúbal and Navarrete, in La Riojana A-68. ACCIONA led the Temporary Companies Union (UTE) that was made with the 24 kilometers of road for about 100 million, and celebrated a public act in which Ábalos and the general director of Roads, Javier Herrero, also indicated by the UCO as a key figure to facilitate awards to ACCIONA, presided over a delegation with representatives of the UTE and leaders of La Rioja.

In the construction sector, silence has been imposed on the slab that weighs on acts. In the underground of the roads as it passed through Murcia, Action and Ferrovial were imposed on rivals of the squad of the greats, such as Dragados (ACS), FCC, Ohla, Comsa, Sacyr and San José, already not quoted construction such as Sando, Rover Alcisa, Aldesa, Chm, Copa, bridges and shoes or Azvi, among others. From Ferrovial, any comment on his achievements with ACCIONA is eluded.

The trio formed by Cerdán, Ábalos and García, in alleged collusion with Actiona, did not go for any project. The execution of the Pulpí-Vera platform, even in works on Almería soil, was one of the largest contracts tendered by ADIF in 2018, with a base budget of 206 million. That section of the High Speed ​​Mediterranean corridor was part of one of the star initiatives of Transportation, the link between Murcia and Almería budgeted at 3,000 million. In that tender, very exposed to public opinion and the entire contriver sector, the Alianza de Acciona and Ferrovial defeated the same companies as in the underground of Murcia and others such as Sogeosa, Rubau, Cyopsa-Sisocia, Copcisa, Sarrion, Torrescámara or Ortiz.