The Minister of Defense, Margarita Robles, has said that “everyone has to know what they have to do” about whether former minister José Luis Ábalos should resign from his seat as a deputy after the arrest of his former advisor Koldo García for the alleged collection of commissions on the purchase of masks.
In an interview on Spanish National Radio, she was asked if she believes that Ábalos should leave his seat in order to defend himself or take on this process well, to which he limited himself to pointing out: “It’s not my place to say, everyone has to know.” what you have to do at all times.” And as to whether she trusts Ábalos, she has insisted: “It is not about the personal opinion that I may have, which has no value, it is about the judicial proceedings.”
However, he commented that “this is a country in which we all carry out parallel trials but the important thing is what the judges say and therefore maximum collaboration with the justice system so that it goes to the end in determining the responsibilities that may exist.” “We also tend a lot to make speculations and presumptions. I am certainly never going to make them,” he added.
Margarita Robles has indicated that she had “seen Koldo García in the Congress of Deputies” and as to whether she was surprised by what was revealed in this investigation, she has indicated that she cannot make assessments of an open judicial procedure. “The judge has taken a series of precautionary measures and there are accusations of facts that embarrass us all,” she said.
In this regard, he has maintained that “in the Government and in the PSOE it has been said, what has happened is a shame, it is absolutely unacceptable that someone who is an advisor within a Ministry can carry out these actions.”
“It is justice that has to determine it but it is something that causes embarrassment and we hope that the clarification of the facts is reached to the end and that the response of justice is exemplary,” the minister added.
And he concluded by pointing out that “in any case, corruption is always inadmissible, but prevailing in a situation of pain and suffering such as the pandemic to profit personally is especially despicable.”
