The Court of Auditors requests a report from the State Bar in the face of “doubts” about the legality of the guarantees of the 'procés'

Francesc Homs, Artur Mas and Carles Puigdemont, three of the high-ranking officials convicted by the Court of Accounts, in the CDC primaries in 2016. MASSIMILIANO MINOCRI

The Court of Accounts has requested this Tuesday a report from the State Lawyers after showing its "doubts" about the "sufficiency and legality" of the guarantees presented by the Institut Català de Finances (ICF), dependent on the Generalitat, to address to the assurance of the 5.4 million euros that are claimed from 34 former senior officials and officials of the Catalan administration for their alleged involvement in the

process

independentista, according to sources from the Court.

The supervisory body wants to know if these guarantees "may or may not cover possible accounting responsibilities due to fraud or gross negligence, which are directly assumed by the affected autonomous administration itself," in reference to the Generalitat.

The investigating delegate, Esperanza García, states in her request that the report be prepared as soon as possible, despite which the State Attorney's Office does not have a specific deadline to carry it out.

More information

• Aragonès avoids resignations at the Catalan Institute of Finance for endorsements to high-ranking positions

• Three members of the board of the Institut Català de Finances resigned before the endorsement of the 34 former senior officials

The Court's decision supposes, on the one hand, delaying its decision after last Thursday it already agreed to paralyze the seizures of property that had begun early in the morning after being informed by the lawyers of the former high-ranking officials of the imminent arrival. of the warranty. During the previous day, the arrival of the guarantees was repeatedly announced, for which processing problems had arisen, according to the defenses. A substantial part of these problems were the resignations registered at the Institut Català de Finances (ICF) as a result of this matter.

On the other hand, the decision of the Court of Accounts clearly represents a summons to the Government. Given the relationship between the Executive and the State Bar, a body created to essentially preserve the interests of the Public Treasury, the request for the report reflects the will to know the Government's criteria in a matter that affects the alleged misuse of public funds . The location is all the more significant when arriving at a time when the Executive had made it clear that the State Bar was not going to continue to act in the case against the 34 former high-ranking officials and officials of the Generalitat.

The reason is that a ruling issued by the Court of Auditors itself in 2018 denied that the Lawyers had active standing to participate in the procedure on the diversion of public money to organize the consultation of 9-N, 2014. The Government argued just two years ago weeks that the Lawyers, therefore, would not file a claim for this file to enter its next phase, that of the procedure that must lead to the holding of an oral hearing in which the accounting responsibilities now demanded on a preventive basis are established.

The decision of the Court of Accounts has transcended during the press conference after the weekly meeting of the Catalan Executive. The spokesperson, Patrícia Plaja, has insisted on the legal neatness of the fund of 10 million euros with which the Generalitat intends to pay the bonds to the exalted positions investigated and has asked the Court of Accounts "not to do politics", reports

Camilo S. Baquero

. The decree law of the Government, which launched the formula of guarantees and counter-guarantees, will be validated by the Parliament this Thursday and will go ahead thanks to the pro-independence majority in the Catalan Chamber.

The session of validation of the decree-law coincides with the deadline that the Council of Statutory Guarantees (CGE) has to issue a non-binding opinion on whether or not the norm conforms to the law. That report had been requested by the PSC (which has avoided charging directly against the fund, pending the response of the entity), but it is key for the Government, which considers that if it receives a boost or the observations are not very substantive , it would be very difficult for the supervisory body to reject the guarantees. It opens

de facto

, in addition, the possibility of a legal train crash between the State Bar and the CGE.

The Council, however, is always very critical in its assessment of Catalan laws and, on many occasions, has clearly warned that they invade state powers, for example, in the case of the rent cap.

Paralyzed the embargoes

Last Thursday, the court paralyzed the seizures of assets that it had decided early in the morning to cover the bond imposed on the 30 former high-ranking officials and officials of the Generalitat of Catalonia who had not provided the necessary guarantees after the lawyers of these they communicated to the Court of Auditors that their clients had decided to avail themselves of the guarantees of the ICF to face the assurance of the millionaire amount that is claimed from them for the expenses that the Catalan administration allegedly diverted to the foreign promotion of the

procés

independence.

The

president

Pere Aragonès spent last Saturday on tiptoe on the controversy sparked by how these guarantees were approved within the ICF. In a ceremony in Terrassa (Barcelona), Aragonès limited himself to expressing his gratitude to “all the public servants” for “the commitment” to their work and ignored the fact that three independent directors of the ICF had left their post before voting the approval of the guarantee in case of disagreement with it.