Former PP strongman accuses party over slush fund

Cash was handed to the party by businessmen competing for public contracts, according to ex-treasurer

EX-treasurer of the national Partido Popular (PP), Luis Barcenas has accused his former party of operating a parallel system of accounts from 1989 to 2009 which allowed companies and businessmen to pay in large amounts of money in exchange for favouritism over public contracts.

Sr Barcenas – who is currently serving a prison sentence for his role in the notorious Gürtel corruption case – sent his ‘confession’ to the public prosecutor this week, just six days before the start of the trial for the alleged illegal funding of the PP.

In the letter, seen by state broadcaster RTVE, he claims that he showed all the documentation relating to the illegal accounts to former PM Mariano Rajoy in 2009, who was PP leader at the time.

According to Sr Barcenas, Sr Rajoy destroyed the paperwork in front of him but he had kept a copy of the material.

The former party treasurer also claimed that Sr Rajoy and other senior PP members received payments from the slush fund that was created from the illicit ‘donations’ from company bosses.

Sr Barcenas stated that he now wanted to collaborate fully with the investigation, following the advice of his lawyer.

He also admitted that previously he had hidden information because the PP had promised him that they would protect his wife Rosalía Iglesias and she would be kept out of prison, but this had not occurred.

Slush fund

Explaining how the system worked, Sr Barcenas claimed that money was paid to the party and recorded in a system of parallel accounts – the ‘B’ accounts’ – which were kept secret.

This was so the money could be used ‘for other purposes’. He added that the donations were ‘linked to the awarding of lucrative public contracts’.

According to the treasurer, the slush fund received around €500,000 in 2007 and more than €1 million in 2008.

He claimed that €900,000 from the illicit fund was spent on remodelling the PP party headquarters in Madrid.

The revelations caused a political storm in Spain on Wednesday.

Podemos party spokesman Pablo Echenique claimed it showed that the PP had been ‘stealing for 28 years’.

He added that it also provided evidence of why the PP did not want to renew the national court judicial appointments, which has been pending for more than two years.

However, PP spokesman Javier Maroto said that Sr Barcenas was ‘part of the past’ and the PP was not interested in the accusations of a prisoner which formed part of his defence strategy for the upcoming court case.

“There is always a black sheep in all political parties,” he stated.