Judge José Antonio Gómez, who is investigating emergency contracts in Andalusia, summoned the Minister of Sustainability and Environment, Catalina García, as a witness to clarify whether, when she was Deputy Minister of Health, she had requested a change in the supervision of the aforementioned agreements in 2020. The Andalusian government canceled the prior inspection of emergency health contracts in the middle of the pandemic so that the analysis could take place. behind me. The decision was relevant because it affected agreements worth $242 million with private healthcare and was made without the required prior reporting, only at a verbal request from Garcia to the former Deputy Secretary of the Treasury, Roberto Ochoa, who was also cited as a witness, in the call. council, The General Assembly of Deputy Ministers prepares the contents that are finalized with the approval of the Board of Directors.
The judge, president of the 13th Court of Education in Seville, issued an order subpoenaing Garcia and Ochoa as witnesses on January 20 after the Anti-Corruption Prosecutor’s Office requested it this week. Since they appear as witnesses, they are obligated to tell the truth before the judge, the prosecutor’s office, and the charges brought in the case.
The aim of both statements is to clarify how the Andalusian Executive Authority changed the control of emergency contracts, given that this was done in the Government Council on October 6, 2020 in a hurry, without the technical reports and the obligatory report for public intervention and without the proposal of the General Committee of Deputy Ministers. That is, the decision-making body of the government of Juan Manuel Moreno overlooked due process and based the change in supervision only on a verbal comment or proposal among Council deputies, according to the testimony of Martínez, the former Auditor General of the Council.
The Anti-Corruption Public Prosecution had previously requested a year ago from the Andalusian government the complete file prepared for approval to transfer the audit of investigative contracts, but the Presidency of the Executive Authority claimed that it had submitted it even though it did not have the technical reports. Time has shown that these mandatory reports did not exist at all, as the Deputy Minister of Economy and Finance admitted. It remains to be seen what version Garcia and Ochoa will present on this issue next January.
Martinez argued before the judge that in 2020, as auditor general, she received pressure from her subordinates to make pre-inspection more flexible and effective. behind me Through permanent financial oversight, supervisory control over spending was reduced, according to sources in the case who were present during his investigation. “In that year alone, the number of deaths in Andalusia reached 6,700 people, and 30,000 people were hospitalized. Many of them are close to me,” the Vice-Chancellor justified as he left the court.
But the deputy minister evaded a very important detail confirmed by the two auditors of the Andalusian Health Authority (SAS) who also testified 10 days ago: between March, when the pandemic was declared, and October 6, when the Government Council approved the change in supervision, the Public Intervention, the elite body that studies all the expenditures of the Andalusian executive, issued two objection reports that paralyzed part of the expenditures because it considered them illegal.
Therefore, these objections from auditors are a relevant signal explaining why the executive decided to change inspection. behind me, Note that the intervention considered it illegal, which was later revealed by monitoring reports between 2021 and 2023 that analyzed the spending of these 242 million who are now being questioned by the judicial investigation.