The investigation into the case of corruption in the importation of masks during the covid, which has led to the arrest of Koldo García, advisor to the then Minister of Development, José Luis Ábalos, also extends to the Balearic Islands. Those responsible for the Health Service during the Francina Armengol Government confirm that they contracted with the company under investigation to purchase 1.4 million masks worth 3.7 million.
The purchase was approved in the midst of a state of alarm, in May 2020. The company approached health officials in the Balearic Islands to offer them part of the content of various material chartered from China on a plane. He did the same with other administrations and autonomous communities, such as the Canary Islands.
The Balearic Government completed the purchase through a contract carried out through a negotiated procedure without advertising. The masks arrived shortly after on the island and, when the health certification was carried out, it was found that, despite the fact that 2.5 euros had been paid for each one of them, the equivalent of an FPP2 mask, the reality is that their properties They were those of a surgical mask, whose average price was around 0.42 euros each.
The Government decided to store this material in anticipation that they could be used if the pandemic prolonged and stock equivalent to that of a surgical mask was needed. They were stored until the end of the pandemic was declared, in May 2023 on the eve of the elections. From that moment on, the petition to claim the extra cost paid for the masks, 2.6 million euros, began. The claim is not signed until after the elections, when the left has already lost the elections.
The political leaders at the time preferred to remain silent while waiting to find out what exact accusations are being leveled against Ábalos’ advisor, who will be made available to the National Court this Thursday. The collection of bribes is being investigated in several transactions carried out with various ministries, the Ministry of Public Works and the Interior, as well as in the communities of the Balearic Islands and the Canary Islands when the current president of Congress, Francina Armengol, and the Minister of Territorial Policy and Memory were presidents. Democratic, Ángel Víctor Torres.
The Balearic Anti-Corruption Office made a report on the Covid contracts and did not detect irregularities, but it already indicated that the company investigated, Soluciones de Gestión y Apoyo a Empresas, had only four employees in 2018 and an income of 101,058 euros. Its sole administrator is Purdey Investment, which in turn has José Ángel Escorial Senante as administrator.
According to the Balearic Office report, Escorial Senante appears in the case of the so-called ‘Paradise Papers’ with two offshore companies in Malta. In 2008 he was a director of ‘Delta Advisory and Management Services Limited’, and of ‘Arce Investment Consulting Límited’, as well as of ‘Malta Capital’.
“According to the information available to the Office, the National Court, the Anti-Corruption Prosecutor’s Office and the Civil Guard investigated this company last year, regarding possible corruption in Angola, in concert with other companies, through the payment of bribes to public officials by the Spanish company Mercasa, within the execution of a contract to build a food market in Luanda,” the report stated.