BarcelonaThe internal investigation carried out by Esquerra in the case of the posters against the Maragall brothers has left four people on file, Sergi Sabria, Marc Colomer, Tolo Moya and a militant from the Anuya group, but the latter two have been suspended from armed action and have been singled out by the party. They are now subject to sanctions that can range from a two-year suspension to permanent expulsion. It will be the Training Guarantees Committee that will decide whether or not to apply them, and the case will also go through the Ethics Committee, which already has an attempt to challenge some of its members. In a letter to the party, Moya, former ERC communications director, referred to the direct links between the Republican Party’s secretary general, Marta Rovira, and the parallel structure of the counter-campaign that ARA had exposed a few days earlier.
According to ARA, Moya sent an email on Friday morning to the Republican Guarantees Committee indicating the “lack of guarantees” of the internal investigation. The former communications director claims to have provided evidence that three people who make up the ERC’s ethics committee “appear to be involved in the case”: the deputy communications minister, Oriol Durán, the director, Jordi Roig, and Marta Rovira herself. “It is absolutely inappropriate that people who have been directly involved in paying the bills of those financially responsible for the case or in covering up the case, are part of the committee that resolves their responsibilities,” Moya says in the communication to the Guarantees Committee.
Specifically, he claims to have provided during the investigation an audio clip in which Oriol Durán and Jordi Roig “knowledge of the case and say they did not want an investigation” months before ARA revealed the information. At the same time, Moya claims to have provided evidence that Marta Rovira, who returned on Friday from exile after six years, asked in March of this year to “do business with B,” the name under which this parallel structure was named. “It seems to us that this file should be investigated by the party’s Guarantees Committee, a clearly independent body, and not by a body formed by the National Leadership,” Moya concludes. He, Sabria, Colmer and the Anuya gunman testified this week before Xavier Mombella, who prepared the report that was approved by the Executive and the National Council on Friday.
The former communications director also notes that Roig is “responsible for payments made to Relevance.” ARA reports that ERC’s Structure B, made up of grassroots youth activists who were running counter-campaigns, works as follows: Youth submits invoices to ERC and party communications officers pass them directly to Relevance, a company the party is affiliated with. The party has been handling election campaigns since 2016 and internal elections. Ultimately, Relevance made the payments to Youth.
The internal investigation by the Republicans focused on the cartel issue, but did not delve into this payment mechanism. In fact, in the same email, Moya asked that the investigation not be concluded on Friday because he still had to present evidence regarding Structure B and the invoices that the young militants were collecting. One of these young men was the Anoia militant who was tasked with putting up posters against the Maragall brothers because of Alzheimer’s disease. After doing so, the ERC’s communications command had already learned that the posters had left its ranks. Despite this, the Anoia militant continued to collect the invoices, as did one of the boys who hung the posters to remain silent before the judge.
“Prone to fits of apathy. Introvert. Award-winning internet evangelist. Extreme beer expert.”
