The Supreme Court's latest move: It is now investigating cash payments from the PSOE to Ábalos.

MadridSupreme Court Judge Leopoldo Puente has summoned former PSOE manager Mariano Moreno Pavón and Celia Rodríguez, an employee of the party's organizational secretariat, to testify as witnesses on October 29. The magistrate investigating the Koldo case has summoned them following thelatest report of the Central Operative Unit (UCO) of the Civil Guard, where cash payments were allegedly detected by the PSOE to former minister José Luis Ábalos and to his then advisor, Koldo García, about which there was "no information".

In the order issued this Monday, Puente refers to the conversations recorded in this report on "possible cash payments of certain amounts" that would not be recorded by dates or amounts in the information provided by the PSOE, "beyond any possible discrepancy with respect to those that do appear." In some cases, there is a correlation between the messages and the expense reports, but in others "this correspondence has not been able to be confirmed," adds the judge, who therefore summons both the former manager of the party and the employee with whom Koldo García exchanged messages about these cash payments.

Furthermore, the investigating judge recalls that Ábalos and Koldo, in their most recent appearances before the Supreme Court, invoked their right not to testify, "without, consequently, providing any information." Therefore, he believes it is appropriate to "summon the former manager of the PSOE and the employee of the party's organizational secretariat to testify as witnesses" in order to clarify the facts.

On the other hand, this Monday The Spanish has published new data that, according to the newspaper, would prove cash payments that do not match the statements made by the PSOE, at least 7,088.1 euros in 2017 and 2018. The Minister of the Presidency, Félix Bolaños, has downplayed the importance of the newspaper's information and has once again denied the existence of 'B'. According to Bolaños, "these amounts are so small that they will be clarified, just as all the PSOE accounts are being clarified."

"I already have the Ferraz envelope"

The latest report from the UCO (Spanish National University of Catalonia) to which the judge refers reflects that, "according to the information provided by the PSOE (Spanish Socialist Workers' Party), between 2017 and 2021, Ábalos received expense settlements, both by bank transfer and in cash." Specifically, it refers to "a monthly summary of the cash payments made, amounting to 19,638.97 euros." Investigators explain that, from the conversations between Koldo García and his wife, Patricia Uriz, "it has been corroborated that some of these settlements were delivered in cash via envelopes collected at the PSOE headquarters on Calle Ferraz."

In one of the conversations recorded by the UCO, Uriz can be read as saying to Koldo on September 18, 2018: "I already have the envelope from Ferraz." "Shall I drive it to Balbina and leave it there?" he asked. The Civil Guard believes it could be an allusion to "Ábalos's official residence during his ministerial term, located on Balbina Valverde Street in Madrid." "The envelope from Víctor is on my desk, and the one from Ferraz is on the minister's desk," Koldo replied, according to the report, which includes photographs of those envelopes with the PSOE logo in which the banknotes can be seen.

The UCO states that "this delivery coincides with a settlement made in favor of Ábalos for €1,022.22 on September 12, 2018." In this regard, it adds that, "one day before the previous conversation," Celia Rodríguez, whom it identifies as an employee of the PSOE's organizational secretariat, informs Koldo that another colleague who used to replace her "had received €1,020 corresponding to an invoice she had submitted." "That is, a very similar amount to that reported by the party," he explains.

However, the UCO has found other "messages that point to cash deliveries to Ábalos for which no documentary support has been found in the information provided by said party." As an example, it refers to another one from February 7, 2019 in which Celia Rodríguez asked Koldo García if he planned to go to Ferraz, "since the amount corresponding to a hotel in Valencia was still pending delivery." "Hello, Koldo... In the end, the head has gone without giving him the money... If you come tomorrow, it would be better, because I don't like having so much money in the drawer," she told him. "I'm going to Ferraz to pick up the envelope by car and then they'll take me home," Uriz wrote to her husband the next day. The Civil Guard clarifies that "this cash delivery, which appears to be addressed to them on February 8, 2019, had not been received by Ábalos and Koldo from the PSOE treasury for approximately five and three months, respectively."