The former mayor of Arrecife, José Montelongo, who is being tried in the Montecarlo case for his previous stage as Finance Councilor, has stressed several times in his statement that he held that position on a "provisional" basis and that he did not even "know how the administration worked".
"There was a person with training to run the Department of Finance, but due to incompatibility with his work, he could not," he has repeated on several occasions, insisting that he only assumed it as something "provisional" after the 2011 elections, as the socialist councilor Pedro Viera could not do so.
In addition, Montelongo has stressed that he had "neither the knowledge nor the capacity" to prepare a list of the invoices that had to be paid, which is one of the facts for which he is accused, having included invoices from Inelcon and Señalcon investigated in the case. "I had full confidence in the comptroller", he defended this Tuesday before the Sixth Section of the Provincial Court, referring to the also accused Carlos Sáenz, who has already admitted his crimes.
He also added that he trusted the treasurer, although he emphasized the differences between the two officials. "The bad relationship between the treasurer and the comptroller was public and notorious. It was surreal," he said.
He also referred to this at various times in his statement, even stating that he had to act as an "intermediary" between the two. "I found myself in a situation in which, due to the bad relationship, it was my turn to go up or down from the Treasury to the Intervention," he pointed out. This is how he responded when the prosecutor asked him why his signature appears on the list of invoices that were going to be taken to the Plenary for extrajudicial recognition, including them in a fund that was received from the State for payment to suppliers.
"It was prepared by the Intervention," Montelongo assured, who stated that the Department of Finance "has no assigned personnel" and that "he had neither an assistant nor a technician assigned to make this type of document."
"Didn't it seem to you that with your signature you were making the content your own?" the prosecutor insisted, stressing that the comptroller's name did not appear on the document. There, José Montelongo referred to the statement made this Monday by Carlos Sáenz, who confessed but avoided implicating the rest of the people sitting with him in the dock, and assumed that list as his own.
The prosecutor then asked Montelongo if he had not received warnings from the treasurer, who questioned that the order of payments (the order of priority that each invoice should have) was not being respected. In this regard, Montelongo has not denied it, although he has pointed out that he "does not remember the content" of those communications from the treasurer.
What he has recognized are the documents that have been shown to him during the trial, and that he has stated that they were "some writings that were exchanged in the days prior to the holding of the Plenary" between both officials.
Unsigned invoices without entry stamp"
Among the invoices of Inelcon and Señalcon that were recognized in that plenary session, the prosecutor has stressed that there were some that were not signed, and others did not even have an entry stamp in the City Council.
"I can't tell you. The lists are prepared from the corresponding department. Intervention and his team. I think the comptroller was quite clear about this yesterday," Montelongo insisted.
In addition, like the rest of the councilors who have testified as defendants in the case, he has also stated that he did not check or look at the invoices.
"In that Plenary, he said that the invoices were available to all the councilors," the prosecutor reminded him, after mentioning the criticisms raised by the opposition for that extrajudicial recognition, which implies that the contracting procedure has not been complied with in order to make an ordinary payment. "Don't you understand that if someone was supposed to look at them it was you?" the prosecutor insisted, to which Montelongo responded by referring again to the fact that he was in charge of Finance on a "provisional" basis and that he also held other areas, such as Roads and Works and Urbanism.
In addition, he stressed that the comptroller told him that "all the invoices met the conditions to go to the Plenary."
They had denounced the Proselan case, in which the comptroller was convicted
At the request of his lawyer, José Montelongo also recalled that it was his group who denounced the Proselan case, for fraudulent payments to another electricity company, in which among others, Carlos Sáenz was sentenced years later.
That complaint was filed after the outbreak of the Unión case and the breakdown of the pact between the PSOE and the PIL in 2009, and shortly after the socialists suffered a motion of censure. Two years later, Montelongo returned to the government after the elections, as Finance Councilor.
"At that time, did you suspect that Carlos Sáenz might be involved in the events?" his lawyer asked him. "No," Montelongo assured.
First stage as Sports Councilor
Regarding his first stage in the government as Sports Councilor, from the middle of the 2007-2011 legislature, two invoices that he signed from Inelcon are also being investigated. In this regard, he explained that both were for repairs after having suffered copper thefts, both in the San Francisco Javier football field and in "frames of different towers."
Regarding why the same award was not made, Montelongo has pointed out that the date of the invoice - which is the same in both - may not coincide with the date of execution of the work. "In any case, it had the technician's signature," he stressed.
In this part of his statement, like the rest of the councilors of Festivities and Roads and Works accused in the case, José Montelongo has denied that contracts were made from his department.
"Then who decides who is hired?" the prosecutor asked. "Of course the councilors don't", the accused replied, leaving in the air the same doubt that has been hovering since the first session of the trial. And it is that no one has clarified who contacted Inelcon to ask for a budget, who awarded the service and who decided to do it in a fractioned way, instead of unifying in the same award services related to the same act or similar interventions in different streets.
"The power of contracting was held by the mayor. He did not delegate it." That is the only thing that Montelongo has responded in this regard, pointing to Cándido Reguera, as other councilors have done.
Regarding the subsequent signing of the invoices, he has also reiterated the same argument: that they had previously been signed by the technicians of the area.
The former councilor has also assured that he "never had knowledge" of the reports of the former Purchasing technician, Elena Martín, warning of irregularities in the invoices of Inelcon. These reports were prepared after he was Sports Councilor and before he arrived at the Department of Finance, since in the middle there was a period of government of the PP, the PIL and the PNL, for which the councilors Eduardo Lasso (Festivities) and Isabel Martinón (Finance) are accused.
"If no verification was carried out, what was your signature for?" the prosecutor asked, reiterating the same question that she has asked all the former accused councilors, given that all have stated that they did not verify anything and some that they did not even look at the invoices before signing.
"It was a formal matter. The comptroller said it yesterday", Montelongo replied, referring again to the statement of Carlos Sáenz.
