Santos Cerdán, organizational secretary of the PSOE until his resignation last June due to his alleged link with the “Koldo case”, will be called to testify in the trial trial for exclusion from the party of the four now unassigned Santiago councilors: … Mercedes Rosón, Mila Castro, Gonzalo Muíños and Marta Álvarez.
It was the councilors’ lawyer who requested Cerdán’s appearance, because he who signed the disciplinary resolution approved against them. He requested it during the pre-trial hearing, scheduled for September 7 and 8. A session which took place last October and the content of which Europa Press had access to.
The defense of Rosón, Castro, Muíños and Álvarez also requests that they appear as witnesses, in addition to the plaintiffs themselves, four temporary workers of the city’s Socialist Party and former mayor José Antonio Sánchez Bugallo.
However, the Socialist Party’s lawyer opposes and appeals Cerdán’s summons, assuring that she is no longer part of the PSOE and that the petition I’m just looking for a “media effect” given its procedural situation.
The lawyer responsible for the legal representation of the Socialist Party defends the appearance of the director of the Legal Department of Ferraz, believing that this could clarify the handling of disciplinary files. Thus, he emphasizes that he knows the process perfectly, unlike Santos Cerdán who, according to him, Only the proposed resolution is sent to you for signature.
He further proposes to appear as a witness the person responsible for investigating Ferraz’s case and that audio files of press conferences held by the plaintiffs be provided or, in the event the request for such evidence is contested, that the recordings be played during the trial.
Finally, ask that the statements of non-affiliates are not repeated, so that their testimonies are used during the hearing which decided on the precautionary measures requested by the four councilors to prevent their expulsion from the party, an aspect that the magistrate rejects.
On the contrary, The judge accepts all witnesses proposed by the parties and emphasizes that, in the case of Cerdán, the fact that he belongs to the party or not is irrelevant since he is cited as a signatory of the resolution.
He also considers that the records instructor It will be able to illustrate the reasons why sanctions are imposed as well as their mechanisms.
Concerning the request of the PSOE lawyer not to collect the testimonies of the four complainants, the judge recalls that the hearing for the precautionary measures had a precise and determined objective, although it later spoke of the “divine and the human”.
Thus, he emphasizes that, to safeguard the principle of immediacy, a fundamental procedural rule which requires the direct and personal presence of the judge at hearings and debates, All appearance proposals are accepted.
The history of the conflict
The internal conflict in the PSOE of Santiago became definitively public on June 24, 2024, when the six councilors of the municipal group voted in plenary in favor of an ordinance on tourist accommodation against the decision taken by the local management, which opted for abstention.
The same day, the party leadership in Santiago opened a meeting the relief of two employees of the group, the chief of staff and the head of communications, changes that the municipal spokesperson, then Gonzalo Muíños, refused to sign and for which he was suspended from activism for a period of 18 months.
Local leaders then agreed to appoint Gumersindo Guinarte as new spokesperson for the Municipal Group and Marta Abal as secretary, summoning Rosón, Castro and Álvarez to a meeting to ratify said appointments. However, the three councilors did not come because they understood that the appeal was not valid, which led to the dissolution of the entire municipal group and its subsequent expulsion.
After having judicially requested precautionary measures to put an end to their expulsion, which was refused, the four now undesignated councilors presented a lawsuit against the PSOE in which they demand the contestation of disciplinary resolutions for their reintegration into the local municipal group.
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