Arturo González Panero, mayor of Boadilla del Monte from 1999 to 2009, has continued this Wednesday gutting his old party. During the fifth session of the third great trial of the PP by Gürtel, the ex-regidor has assured that the leadership of the popular Madrilenians “knew” and participated in the operation to illegally finance the electoral campaigns of the regional formation, including those of the former regional president Esperanza Aguirre. The former leader is currently charged in the Punic case, where box b of the PP in Madrid is precisely investigated.

The Anticorruption Prosecutor’s Office maintains in this view, which started last week at the National Court, that Gürtel nested in the Boadilla City Council with the approval of Panero, from where they manipulated public contracts to award projects to companies that paid bites. In addition, a part of that money was allegedly used to pay for electoral acts of the PP, which sits on the bench accused of benefiting from the plot. In this trial, 17 of the 24 defendants have confessed and confirmed the thesis of the public prosecutor.

“The regional PP had knowledge,” said this Wednesday Panero, known as The Albondiguilla, and has admitted the accusations made against him. On Tuesday, during the first part of his interrogation, the ex-mayor already described the enormous “ascendancy” that Francisco Correa, leader of the corrupt network, had on the national leadership of the party and how they received calls from La Moncloa to influence issues of the City Council . In this fifth session, to questions from his lawyer, the former mayor focused on the leadership of the PP in Madrid: “Before the campaign, Correa told us that we have to do acts. They are pre-campaign acts, but there are also acts of the regional campaigns. They are acts to which the candidate of the PP of Madrid also came, [Esperanza Aguirre]”.

Throughout his statement, Panero has not stopped throwing darts. “I remember an act that took place in Boadilla, an act that she, [Aguirre], he wanted the closure of the M-50 to the north ”. In turn, the former politician has described how bills were rigged to pay for these events or other initiatives. “On the subject of banners [electorales]It was the party that hired a company for all the municipalities. The party told us which company to hire. If you had to put 20 officially, unofficially they would put another 60. And we were told that another 20 or 30 had to be paid to put them in another municipality. On the one hand, it was paid with the box of the PP of Boadilla, but everything else was paid on the other hand ”, has described the ex-mayor.

In this sense, El Albondiguilla has insisted that a part of current expenses were paid “unofficially, by box b”. Or they were covered with money from illegal commissions, according to their version. “[El coste de ] campaign events, moreover, far exceeded what was permitted by law. And those expenses had to be derived through companies and the payment of commissions ”, he added. An operation that, according to him, was known to the manager of the Madrid PP, Beltrán Gutiérrez, who is accused in the Punic case; and the “campaign manager”, the former popular deputy Alfonso Bosch, who is also accused in this trial. “Bosch was in charge of all the events and coordinated everything,” stressed Panero, who stated that the former regional vice president, Ignacio González, pressured him to influence the award of a plot.

“I am not in the habit of opening envelopes”

The fifth session of the oral hearing, held this Wednesday, has served to finalize the interrogation of Panero and begin with the declaration of the seven defendants who have not admitted the facts that Anti-Corruption imputes to them. The first to parade before the court was Gonzalo Naranjo, former vice president of the Sufi company and son of the president of said company, Rafael Naranjo, now deceased. The public prosecutor maintains that the plot irregularly awarded them contracts in exchange for illegal commissions. In fact, the Prosecutor’s Office assures that Gonzalo Naranjo delivered in person a bite of 157,800 euros.

But the businessman has denied it this Wednesday. Or, at least, he has claimed that he was never aware that he gave that money to the corrupt network. In this sense, he added that he was able to deliver an envelope that contained the bite, but that it was “closed” and that he never knew what was inside. Just at that moment, Naranjo has taken out before the court three bundles of counterfeit 500 euro bills and has placed them in a package: “150,000 euros are three packages that fit in an envelope.”

“Do you mean that if you had brought that money, you would not have suspected it?” His lawyer asked him then.

“It is impossible to detect it and I am not in the habit of opening the envelopes that my father or my boss gives me.” And in this case, both conditions were met – Naranjo Jr. has responded.